
n^^. T-4.V7 



Book_ 



-9? 

UtlOOkfttAMA 



w 



THE LINCOLN 




ORY-CALENDAR 



The True Lincoln Stories and the 

Master Story-Teller's Own 

Reasons for Them 



-7^ 




HERE is nothing else in life or literature like the Lincoln story. 
There are many collections of so-called stories and "yams" attrib- 
uted to Abraham Lincoln. He once said of these that only about 
one in six attributed to him had ever been told by himself. This 
ratio has diminished, doubtless, since his death. The true Lincoln 
story is that which illustrates, illuminates or enforces a truth. His 
stories, torn from their surroundings, lose their point, their peculiar Lincoln tang, 
their sparkle, their very life. Lincoln's anecdotes shed gleams of light on many 
dark subjects. The best of them are those which throw light upon himself and his 
own quaint and original personality. That is the object of "The Lincoln Story- 
Calendar." Lincoln's early life is herein given in narrative form with an occasional 
illustration by the master story-teller himself. His later and more public career 
is illumined by flashes and gleams of Lincoln's wit and humor. It is interesting to 
note President Lincoln's own reasons for telling his many stories, as he stated them 
to Col. Silas W. Burt, late one night in the summer of '63, as given in "The Cen- 
tury Magazine" for February, 1907. Colonel Burt relates that one of the party 
then interviewing the President, at the Soldiers' Home, carelessly said: 
" 'Mr. President, tell as-one of your good stories.' 

"The President dre ., himself up and with great dignity addressed us, saying : 
*I believe I have the popular reputation of being a story-teller, but I do not de- 
serve the name in its general sense; for it is not the story itself, but its purpose, 
or effect, that interests me. I often avoid a long and useless discussion by others, 
or a laborious explanation on my own part, by a story that illustrates my point of 
view. So, too, the sharpness of a refusal or the edge of a rebuke may be blunted 
by an appropriate story, so as to save the wounded feeling and yet serve the pur- 
pose. No, I am not simply a story-teller, but story-telling, as an emollient, saves 
me much friction and distress.' " 







/ 



• If 

M4JI 



w 



THE LINCOLN 




STORY-CALENDAR 



') 




SIGNING THE EMANCIPATION PROCLAMATION, 

NEW YEAR'S DAY 

N the first day of January, 1863, Abraham Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proc- 
lamation, which ranks with the Magna Charta of the English barons and the 
simple and devout "Compact" signed by the Pilgrim Fathers in the cabin of the 
"Mayflower," as one of the greatest documents of freedom in all history. 

During the long, disastrous, distressing summer of '62 President Lincoln had 
devoted many secret hours to putting this immortal paper into the right form. He 
had been nagged and badgered by abolitionists and others who went away from 
his presence saying he was entirely too slow and timid to free the slaves. While 
his heart yearned to liberate the negro his head held him back. From his height he could view, as 
no one else could see, that the hour for emancipation had not yet struck. 

One day a new committee called to urge him to make an ofiBcial declaration of freedom for 
the blacks of the South. He replied vyith a sad smile, which they thought hopeless, that if he de- 
clared the negroes free, now, while the Federal armies were being defeated in battle after battle, 
"it would be like the pope's bull against the comet." 

About the middle of September, 1862, when he really had the document written and was only 
waiting for the right psychological moment to announce it, a group of ministers from Chicago 
waited upon him to urge him to do something short, sharp and decisive for the negro. He dared 
not let them know how much his own sentiments accorded with theirs, so he saw them leave the audi- 
ence, murmuring and dissatisfied. But one of them, unable to give up, returned with this final appeal : 
"Sir," said he, "a message has come from our divine Master commanding you, through me, to open the 
door of bondage that the slave may go free!" 

The beleaguered President, with a ghastly smile, instantly replied: 

"I have studied this question by night and by day, for weeks and for months. Isn't it rather odd that the 
only channel your divine Master could send such a message by is the roundabout route by way of that awful 
wicked city of Chicago ?" 

Those ministers must have been astounded, a few days later, to see the announcement that the 
President had issued his Emancipation Proclamation on September 22, 1862, to go into effect one 
hundred days later, which happened to be the first day of January, 1863. 

When the President came in from the popular New Year's Day reception, he sat down to sign 
the great document, but he found his hand was lame and his fingers too unsteady to write. 
Looking up at Mr. Seward, the Secretary of State, who had just laid the paper before him, he said: 

"I have been shaking hands since nine o'clock this morning and my right arm is almost paralyzed. If my 
name ever goes into history it will be for this act and my whole soul is in it. If my hand trembles when I 
sign the Proclamation, all who examine the document hereafter will say, 'He hesitated.' " 

He then turned and deliberately wrote the signature with which the world is now familiar and 
of which this is a reduced facsimile: 



I9IO 



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J 



THE LINCOLN 




STORY-CALENDAR 



LINCOLN'S GRANDFATHER 




BRAHAM LINCOLN, grandfather to the President, was a young 
man of considerable wealth for his time. A lover of adventure, he 
went from Virginia to Kentucky during the dangerous days of 
Daniel Boone, who was a distant relative, both Lincoln and Boone 
being of Quaker descent. After Lincoln had taken a large tract of 
land and built a cabin on it, he went back to Virginia and brought his wife and 
three sons, Mordecai, Josiah and Thomas, with him to the wilds of Kentucky. 

While working with his sons in the clearing, not far from his log house, the 
father was shot by one of a band of Indians hidden in the edge of the forest. The 
two older boys ran in different directions, Mordecai into the cabin for a gun, and 
Josiah to the stockade, not far away, for assistance. Little Thomas, the youngest, 
a boy of six, was left beside his father's body. A huge Indian stole out of the 
woods and was just bending over to seize the little boy 
when, with a sudden cry, he threw up his hands and fell 
dead beside the white man he had just killed. It was 
Mordecai's unerring aim, shooting between the logs of 
the cabin. 

Thus released, the little boy, with the instinct of a 
wild creature, ran toward the house and was met and 
rescued before the other Indians could follow him. Mor- 
decai held the savages at bay until Josiah arrived with 
help from the fort, and little Thomas Lincoln was spared 
to grow to manhood and become the father of the six- 
teenth President of the United States. "' '"'T "S ^l "'T'! ""* "" 

dead betide the white mui 




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1910 



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8 



i) 



THE LINCOLN 




#J 



STORY-CALENDAR 



UNCLE MORDECAI 




ORDECAI LINCOLN never forgave the red man for the murder 
of his father. He is said to have become "an inveterate Indian 
stalker," and seems to have cared little whether the savage who 
came within the range of his rifle was friend or foe. He went on the 
assumption that "the only good Indian is a dead Indian." Being his 
father's eldest son he inherited all the property left in the family, 
as the English custom of primogeniture prevailed in Virginia and Kentucky at that 
time. It is quite likely that Grandfather Abraham's property was in bad shape for 
any one to inherit at the time of his sudden death. Mordecai Lincoln became 
sheriff of Washington County, Kentucky, was a member of the State legislature 
and was a good and influential citizen in that rough, wild country. He was an 
honest man and, in spite of his deadly disposition toward the Indian, was said to 
be as tender-hearted as a woman. 

It is highly interesting to quote what an old friend 
was fond of telling about Mordecai Lincoln, the Presi- 
dent's uncle: 

"He was, naturally, a man of considerable genius and 
great drollery. It would almost make you laugh to look 
at him. I never saw but one other man whose quiet, droll 
look excited in me the same disposition to laugh, and that 
was Artemus Ward. Mordecai was quite a story-teller, 
and in this Abe resembled his 'Uncle Mord,' as we called 
him. 



Abe Lincoln had a very high opinion of his uncle, •;^%^-4 _, 
and on one occasion remarked : 'I have often said that 7;W^f^L-''i ^'''i^ ^^' 
Uncle Mord had run off with 



M^> 









all the talents of 




the - '\**^l--fA^' 



family.' " 



'Ad inveterftte Indi&n Stalker* 



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10 



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II 



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13 14 15 



^ 



i 




STORY-CALENDAR 




ABRAHAM LINCOLN'S FATHER AND MOTHER 

HOMAS LINCOLN moved about with his mother from one country place in Ken- 
tucky to another. He was brought up a "wandering laboring boy," with no 
chance to get an education or any property. He was not enterprising or indus- 
trious, as his son proved to be. He hired out as a farm hand and managed to 
learn the trade of a carpenter and cabinetmaker. He was an honest, good-na- 
tured man, often imposed upon, but he became, when aroused, a "formidable 
adversary." "He was above the medium height, with a powerful frame, and had 
a wide local reputation as a wrestler." 
He Uved and learned his trade with a man named Berry, the guardian of an orphaned niece. 
Nancy Hanks. "Nancy was above the ordinary height, weighed about one hundred and thirty 
pounds was slenderly built and had much the appearance of one inclined to consumption. Her 
skin was dark; hair dark brown; eyes gray and small; forehead prominent; face sharp and angu- 
lar with a marked expression of melancholy which fixed itself in the memory of every one who ever 
knew her. Though her life was seemingly beclouded by a spirit of sadness, she was m disposition 
amiable and generally cheerful." ^ . , ^ „ , 

Nancy was in her twenty-third year when she was married to Thomas Lincoln, June 12, 1806, 
by Jesse Head, a neighboring local preacher of the Methodist Church. 

Dennis Hanks, a cousin of Nancy's, who afterwards became a member of Thomas Lincoln s 
family once told of the early married life of Thomas and Nancy Lincoln, at Elizabethtown, Kentucky: 
"When Nancy married Tom he was workin' in a carpenter shop. It wasn't Tom's fault he couldn t 
make a livin' by his trade. Thar was sca'cely any money in that kentry. Every man had to do his 
own tinkerin', an' keep everlastin'ly at it to get enough to eat. So Tom tuk up some land. It was 
mighty ornery land, but it was the best Tom could git 
when he hadn't much to trade for it. . . . 

"Tom thought a heap o' Nancy, an' he was as good 
to her as he knowed how. He didn't drink or swear 
or play cyards or fight, an' them was drinkin', cussin', 
quarrelsome days. Tom was popylar, an' he could lick a 
bully if he had to. He just couldn't git ahead, some- 
how." 

Thomas and Nancy Lincoln removed from Elizabeth- 
town, after the birth of their first child, Sarah, to Rock 
Spring Farm on Nolen Creek near Hodgensville, Ken- 
tucky. Here Abraham Lincoln was born in the little log 
cabin, which illustrations have made famihar, on the twelfth 
day of February, 1809. 




'-^-•'-- 



"'S***!: 



The little log' cabin which illustrations have 
made fdmiliar 



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16 



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m 



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THE LINCOLN 




9 



STORY.CALENDAR 



LIFE ON KNOB CREEK 




ANCY'S boy baby" grew up in the cabin at Nolen Creek, learning to walk, play- 
ing with flowers and berries down by "the spring," watching birds and rabbits, 
like any other backwoods baby. When he was four years old he must have 
been happy when his father, mother and sister removed vdth him to Knob 
Creek, a dozen miles distant, where the father thought the land might be a 
little better for farming. Evidently Thomas Lincoln was tired of carpenter 
work, or he could get very little of it to do around Nolen Creek. 

At Knob Creek little Abe went with his sister to school to Zechariah 
Riney, and played with a boy named Austin Gollaher, who lived to be a very old man and loved 
to tell of saving the little Lincoln boy from drowning in the creek. In this humble home a baby 
brother was born and lived out his little life. Here the mother told the brother and sister stories 
from the Bible and talked to them about being good and living right, for both parents were re- 
ligious in their rude, simple way. Nancy Hanks could read, and in the evening, after the work 
was all done, she used to instruct and entertain them from the very few books the family pos- 
sessed. In order to prolong these hours of pleasure, little Abe, small as 
he was, would go out and cut spice-wood bushes to make a bright fire and 
a "sweet savor" for them all to enjoy together. 

The boy was sometimes sent to mill, and sometimes he helped his 
father by dropping corn and doing a boy's work about the little farm. 
That he went fishing occasionally is shown by the little story he once told -'**7'/ 
when asked what he remembered of the War of 1812: 

"Nothing but this," he replied. "I had been fishing one day and caught 
a little fish which I was taking home. I met a soldier on the road and, 
having been always told at home that we must be good to the soldiers, 
I gave him my fish." 

Lincoln once stated that his father disapproved of slavery in Kentucky 
and that was one reason for the family's removing from that State when 
the boy was seven years old. One of the last things the mother did was , 
to take Sarah and little Abe to visit their baby brother's grave, before 
emigrating to the still wilder country of Indiana Territory, which was ad- 
mitted as a State that year, 1816. 







* I getve him my Msh * 



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JANUARY 



1910 



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23 24 25 26 27 



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28 29 



THE LINCOLN 




STORY-CALENDAR 




IN CAMP AND CABIN 

HOMAS LINCOLN built a flatboat and started on ahead of his little 
family to reconnoiter. He found a place which he thought suited their 
purpose on Prairie Fork of Pigeon Creek, in Spencer County, Indiana. 
Then he went back, where a rough trail had been blazed, and, in due 
time reached the old home in Kentucky, a journey of about one hun- 
dred miles. Loading his family and the few effects he had left in Ken- 
tucky on two horses, Thomas and his family "packed through to 
Posey's," a place on the Ohio, near Troy, in Perry County, Indiana, where he had left 
the furniture and other property on his first trip. Here they hired a wagon, loaded it 
and went on their way toward Pigeon Creek, camping and cooking at night. It was 
slow traveling, for the father had often to clear a road for the team with an ax. 

When they arrived at Prairie Fork they had to camp out while building a hut to live 
in. Thomas Lincoln put an ax into the hands of little Abe, who then began uncon- 
sciously to hew his way to the presidency. They first built a half-faced camp or shed 
made of poles, enclosed on three sides only, like a horse-shed. Under this poor shelter 
they lived a year, when Thomas, with the help of his seven-year-old son, had succeeded 
in erecting a one-room log cabin about fourteen feet square, no more commodious or 
comfortable than the poor hovels they had left behind them 
in Kentucky. Although Thomas Lincoln was a carpenter 
and cabinetmaker his cabin had neither door nor window. 
Of course he had much to do in clearing land and hunting the 
game on which the family subsisted. In these days, when hunt- 
ing seemed such a necessity, Abraham Lincoln did not like gun- 
ning. He was too tender-hearted to kill even legitimate game. 
In the odd little autobiography he wrote for a friend, many years 
after this, Mr. Lincoln wrote of himself in the third person: 

"A few days before the completion of his eighth year, in the 
absence of his father, a flock of wild turkeys approached the new 
log cabin; and Abraham, with a rifle gun, standing inside, shot 
through a crack and killed one of them. He has never since 
pulled the trigger on any larger game." "« ""° "^s"" *". ''•'' ''" ""^ 




I9I0 


JANUARY— FEBRUARY 


1910 


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MON. TUES. WED. THUR. FRL 


SAT 


30 


31 I 2 3 4 


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THE LINCOLN 




i 



STORY-CALENDAR 




LINCOLN'S BIRTHDAY 

ON THE LIFE-MASK OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

Richard Watson Gilder 

HIS bronze doth keep the very form and mold 
Of our great martyr's face. Yes, this is he; 
That brow of wisdom, all benignity ; 

That human, humorous mouth; those cheeks that hold 

Like some harsh landscape all the summer's gold; 
That spirit fit for sorrow, as the sea 
For storms to beat on; the lone agony 

Those silent, patient lips too well foretold. 

Yes, this is he who ruled a world of men 
As might some prophet of the elder day 
Brooding above the tempest and the fray 

With deep-eyed thought and more than mortal ken. 
A power was his beyond the touch of art 
Or armed strength — his pure and mighty heart. 




From Volk'j Life-Mtuk 



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8 



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II 12 



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w^ 



THE LINCOLN 



STORY-CALENDAR 





THE PASSING OF THE "ANGEL MOTHER" 

FTER the Lincoln family had moved from the shed of poles into the house of 
logs, Thomas and Betsy Sparrow, relatives of the Hanks family, came over 
from Kentucky and lived in the camp, intending to build themselves a cabin 
This was m 1818; the Lincolns had then lived in Indiana two years, and were 
yet without a comfortable home, even as hardy pioneers counted comforts 
During the autumn of that year three of the two families were seized with a 
terrible, malignant disease, which attacked the cattle also, and was called "the 
milk-sick." Thomas and Betsy Sparrow died first and little Abe helped make their 
rude coffins, for which his father cut the lumber out of surrounding trees with his whipsaw. While 
they were doing this the poor wife and mother was taken worse. There was no doctor within 
thirty-five rniles. Nancy Hanks Lincoln had suffered too much from privation, exposure and 
other hardships to survive such an attack. Realizing that she had not long to Uve, she talked 
long and earnestly with Sarah and little Abe. They did everything they could for their darling 
mother but she had not strength enough to rally. Feeling that the end was near she beckoned 
her children, who knelt by her bedside. Laying her thin white hands on their heads, she told them 
to be good to each other, take care of their father, and live so that they could meet her in heaven, 
and she, who gave us Lincoln and never knew," passed out of her hard life. 

The heart-broken little family buried the wife and mother, on a knoll in the edge of the clear- 
ing beside the new-made graves of her cousins Thomas and Betsy, whose deaths deprived the 
orphaned Denms Hanks of his foster parents also. The Lincolns took the forlorn lad. several 
years older than Abe, into their own motherless family. 
Dennis thus became Abe's almost constant companion 
and it is from his memories that we have learned 
the little we know about Abraham Lincoln's boy- 
hood. 

It was nearly a year before the funeral of Nancy 
Lincoln could be held. It has been said that the first 
letter Abraham ever wrote was to good old Parson 
Elkin, back in their "old Kentucky home," to ask him 
to visit them next time he came within fifty miles of 
Prairie Fork and preach his mother's funeral sermon. 
This the good preacher did during the following sum- 
mer. Abe always blessed the memory of his "angel 
mother," as he had learned, while a little boy, to call 







his own mother. 



Abe helped make their rude coffins 



J9I0 FEBRUARY 

SUN. MON. TUES. WED. 

13 14 15 16 



THUR. 

17 



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18 



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THE LINCOLN 




STORY-CALENDAR 



WASHINGTON'S BIRTHDAY 

THE PERPETUATION OF OUR POLITICAL INSTITUTIONS 




HE closing words of an address delivered January 27th, 1837, by Lincoln before 
the Young Men's Lyceum, a debating society he was instrumental in organizing 
shortly after he went to live in Springfield, Illinois. This was his first address, 
delivered at the age of twenty-five. It was in the involved style he at first 
affected and contains no hint of his Inaugurals or the simple grandeur of the 
Gettysburg Address. * 

"Another reason which once was, but which, to the same extent, is now no 
more, has done much in maintaining our institutions thus far. I mean the 
powerful influence which the interesting scenes of the Revolution had upon the 
passions of the people as distinguished from their judgment. By this influence, 
the jealousy, envy, and avarice incident to our nature . . . were for the time in a great measure 
smothered and rendered inactive, while the deep-rooted principles of hate, and the powerful motive 
of revenge, instead of being turned against each other, were directed exclusively against the British 
nation. . . . But this state of feeling must fade, is fading, has faded with the circumstances that 
produced it. 

"I do not mean to say that the scenes of the Revolution are now or ever will be entirely for- 
gotten, but that, like everything else, they must fade upon the memory of the world, and grow 
more and more dim by the lapse of time. ... At the close of that struggle nearly every adult male 
had been a participator in some of its scenes. The consequence was that of those scenes, in the 
form of a husband, a father, a son, or a brother, a living history was to be found in every family 
— a history ... in the limbs mangled, in the scars of wounds received in the midst of the very 
scenes related — a history, too, that could be read and understood alike by all, the wise and the 
ignorant, the learned and the unlearned. But those histories are gone. . . . 

"They were pillars of the temple of liberty, and now that they have crumbled away that temple 

must fall unless we, their descendants, supply their places with other 
pillars hewn from the solid quarry of sober rea- 
son. Passion has helped us, but can do so no 
more. It will in future be our enemy. Reason 
— cold, calculating, unimpassioned reason — 
must furnish all the materials for our future 
support and defense. Let those materials be 
molded into general intelligence, sound moral- 
ity, and, in particular, a reverence for the Con- 
stitution and laws; and that we improved to 
the last, that we remained free to the last, that 
we revered his name to the last, that during 
his long sleep we permitted no hostile foot to 
pass over or desecrate his resting place, shall 
be the that which to learn the last trump shall 
awaken our WASHINGTON. 

"Upon these let the proud fabric of free- 
dom rest, as the rock of its basis; and as truly 
as has been said of the only greater institution, 
'the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.' " 





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w 



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THE LINCOLN 




STORY-CALENDAR 



WHAT IS HOME WITHOUT A MOTHER ? 




OOR Tom Lincoln missed his wife as much as a less shiftless man 
could. Sarah and Abe, assisted by Dennis, did all that children could 
do for the forlorn man, but he went about aloof and disconsolate. He 
stayed away on longer hunts than usual, as though loath to hang 
around the cabin. He might have laid the floor, hung the door and 
put oiled paper in the one window-opening to keep out the winter's 
cold, but he seemed not to care. The children, accustomed to such 
neglect, went about their daily work and play. Dennis Hanks has 
told of little Abe's hunger, even then, to read and write. He tells of teaching Abe to 
write his name in the salt of the deer "lick" near by with a stick. Dennis had made 
him pens of turkey-buzzard "quills," and decocted him some briar-root ink, so the boy 
had learned to write. 

One day the lonesome father told the children he was going to visit his former 
home in "Kaintuck." After he had been gone several weeks, they were surprised to 
see him drive up before the cabin with a four-horse team. They could hardly believe 
their eyes, he looked so spruce and alert. They could hardly believe their ears, either, 
when the brisk, happy acting man introduced them to the kind, motherly looking 
woman riding with him, as their new mother. He had heard that Sarah Bush, whom 
he had known in youth, was now a widow. She had married Jailer Johnston, of 
Elizabethtown. He had gone back and proposed to her, married her next day, and 
brought her away at once with her three children and 
household effects. The furniture was marvellous in 
the eyes of the Indiana children, for one piece was a 
"bureau worth forty dollars." 

The advent of Sarah Bush Lincoln brought new 
life and cheer into that neglected household. She 
induced even indolent Thomas Lincoln to exercise 
his ingenuity as a carpenter by laying the floor and 
filling the door and window spaces as they should 
have been two years before. She hung up curtains 
of deerskin, laid rugs of bearskin, and made the house 
cheery and comfortable. And the poor, motherless 
children were washed, combed, clothed; she made 
them, as she once said, "look a little more human." They could hudiy believe themieiTei 




I9IO 



FEBRUARY— MARCH 



1910 



SUN. 



MON. 



27 28 



TUES. 



I 



WED. 



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FRI. 



SAT. 



THE LINCOLN 




STORY.CALCNDAR 



"ABE WAS A MOTHER'S BOY' 




T required a woman of more than ordinary tact to bring up children 
born to three different pairs of parents to live together in unity. But 
Dennis Hanks testifies to the fact that the Lincolns' second mother 
did that with rare success. She had three children of her own, named 
Sarah, Matilda and John Johnson. Because of another Sarah in the 
family, Sarah Lincoln's name was changed to Nancy, for her dead 
mother. Then, besides Abraham, there was the Lincolns' cousin Den- 
nis, making six children for that mother-hearted stepmother to recon- 
cile and rear to man's and woman's estate. 

Sarah Bush Lincoln was not long in discovering that "Abe was no common boy." 
Abraham, on his part, received his new mother with respect and appreciation. A bond 
of sympathy soon brought them closer to each other. Thomas Lincoln couldn't see 
any sense in Abe's reading all the time. He thought that was only an aggravated 
form of laziness. Besides, he had no use for "eddication." It took all his second wife's 
diplomacy and tact to keep him from preventing the boy from reading and study 
altogether. Mrs. Lincoln even induced the father to let Abe go to school now and then. 
For these intercessions Abraham Lincoln never ceased to be grateful to her. He always 
spoke of her as his mother, and most of the fervent praise he bestowed on his mother's 
memory was meant for his good stepmother. 

Dennis Hanks, in after years, described Abraham's life 
in the home, and his devotion to both mothers. (It should be 
borne in mind that Nancy Hanks, Abraham's own mother, 
was Dennis's cousin.) Here is what Dennis told: 

"We had plenty to eat — such as it was — corn dodgers, 
bacon and game, some fish and wild fruits. We had very 
little wheat flour. For clothing we had jeans. Abe was 
grown before he wore all-wool pants. It was a new 
country, and he was a raw boy; rather a bright and likely 
lad; but the big world seemed far ahead of him. We were 
all slow-goin' folks. But he had the stuff of greatness in 
him. He got his rare sense and sterling principles from 

both parents. But his kindliness, humor, love of humanity, ^^^^ ^^^^ Lincoln 

hatred of slavery, all came from his mother. I am free to ..^ ^^^^ „, ^„,^ ,^„ „j^„y 
say Abe was a 'mother's boy.'" tact" 




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MARCH 



1910 



SUN. 



MON. 



TUES. 



8 



WED. 



THUR. 



10 



FRI. 



II 



SAT. 



12 



w 



THE LINCOLN 




STORY-CALCNDAR 



YOUNG ABRAHAM'S SCANTY SCHOOLING 




O when the father could not find a pretext for keeping Abe at home he 
was allowed to go to school. Part of the time he had to walk four and 
a half miles each way, but what of that? Nine miles a day in snowy 
or muddy winter weather was nothing to the joy of learning something 
— something his teacher, a wonderful man who knew everything, could 
tell him. Although Abraham never went to those poor schools a whole 
year in his life, all told, there are many stories about his school days. 
The schoolhouses were built of logs, of course, with floors of "puncheon" or split logs, 
and windows of oiled paper, if there was any substitute at all for glass. They "trapped" 
up and down and spelled down every week. Abe became so proficient in spelling that 
he was always chosen in the "spelling-bees," which formed the social dissipation in- 
dulged in, somewhat as dancing and "bridge" are in modern society. He so excelled 
in spelling that the side lucky enough to choose Abe Lincoln always "spelled down," 
and matters came to such a pass that they had to leave him out of their spelling 
matches. Then he made himself useful in giving out words for the others to spell, or 
acted as referee or umpire in cases of dispute, being the authority instead of "Web- 
ster," "Worcester" or the "Century," which are the court of last resort to-day. 

They did have a book of authority, though. It was Web- 
ster's Speller. Webster's Dictionary existed only in the fond 
imagination of the indefatigable Noah Webster. That great 
work was not published until many years later. 

"Nat" Grigsby, who afterwards married Abe's sister 
Sarah, or Nancy, as she was now called, once told of Abe's 
conduct at school in the following enthusiastic terms: 

"He was always at school early and attended to his 
studies. He was always at the head of his class and passed 
us rapidly in his studies. He lost no time at home, and when 
he was not at his work was at his books. He kept up his 
studies on Sunday, and carried his books with him to work, 
so that he might read when he rested from labor." They "tr.pped- up »nd down 




I9IO 



MARCH 



19IO 



SUN. 



MON. 



TUES. 



WED. 



THUR. 



FRI. 



SAT. 



13 14 IS 16 17 18 19 



w 



THE LINCOLN 




STORY-CALENDAR 



"CRUELTY TO ANIMALS," "MANNERS," "THE 
RULE OF THREE," AND "DOGGEREL" 



HEN Abraham had been in school long enough to acquire a little confidence in him- 
self and his ability to compose, Nat Grigsby further relates that he came for- 
ward with an awkward bow and a deprecating smile to read an essay on the 
wickedness of being cruel to helpless animals. 

Aside from the common branches, including arithmetic to "The Rule of 
Three," as they used to call "Proportion," one teacher, Andrew Crawford, taught 
the school children "manners." Abe's schoolmaster used to laugh over the 
awkwardness of the tallest pupil, who measured nearly six feet at fourteen 
years of age. Some of them believed that he was clumsier than usual, on pur- 
pose, and was "laughing in his sleeve," short as it was, all the while. 
Mrs. Sarah Lincoln told one of his biographers, long afterward, that Abe never owned an 
arithmetic, so he had to make a memorandum book himself, in which he wrote out some of his 
hardest "sums," the tables of measures, and other things, including school-boy rhymes such as: 

Abraham Lincoln 
his hand and pen. 
he will be good but 
God knows When 




Abraham excited the greatest wonder among the neighbors because he 
could make rhymes — "write poetry," as they called it. Many verses are 
attributed to him about which there may be some doubt, like the following 
from a longer "poem" entitled "Adam and Eve's Wedding": 

The woman was not taken from Adam's feet, we see, 

So we must not abuse her, the meaning seems to be. 

The woman was not taken from Adam's head, we know ; 

To show she must not rule him — 'tis evidently so. 

The woman she was taken from under Adam's arm. 

So she must be protected from injuries and harm. 

He wrote another so-called poem, beginning: 

Time, what an empty vapor 'tis, 
And days, how swift they are I 

Abraham's penmanship also became the envy of the boys and. after 
he left school, the lads of the neighborhood used to bring their copy-books 
to him that he might "set copies" for them to imitate. One of these has 
been preserved many years because of its verification in the life of the writer 
of the original couplet-copy: 

Good boys who to their books apply 
Will all be great men by and by. 



/ sfuMndton (jfS9ino/M 

\ /^l.<D '.,—'1 




A leaf from Abe's exerdie 
book 



I9IO 



MARCH 



1910 



SUN. 



MON. 



20 21 



TUES. 



22 



WED. 



THUR. 



FRI. 



SAT. 



23 24 25 26 



THE LINCOLN 




STORY-CALCNDAR 



WHAT HE DID AT HOME 




ENNIS HANKS tells how Abraham spent his time at home: 

Sometimes he would write with a piece of charcoal, or the p'int of a burnt stick, on 
the fence or floor. We sometimes got a little paper at the country town — (Gentryville, a 
mile and a half from Prairie Fork). His first reading book was Webster's Speller. Then 
he got hold of a book — I can't rikkilect the name. It told a yarn about a feller that sailed 
a flatboat up to a rock, and the rock was magnetized and drawed the nails out of his boat, 
and he got a duckin', or drownded or suthin', I forget now. (The books was "The Arabian 
Nights.") Abe would lay on the floor with a chair under his head and laugh over them 
stories by the hour. I told him they was likely lies from end to end ; but he learned to 
read right well in them." 

John Hanks, another cousin, relates: "When Abe and I returned to the house from work, he 
would go to the cupboard, snatch a piece of corn-bread, take a book, sit down, cock his legs up 
as high as his head, and read." 

Abraham read all the books he could borrow within a circuit of fifty miles, and that was not 
very many. A book was a precious thing in the sight of young Abraham. He read some of them, 
including the Bible, over and over. He read the "Revised Statutes of Indiana," which he found at 
Constable Turnham's, as eagerly as boys to-day read "The Count of Monte Cristo" or the stories 
of Conan Doyle. At this time he read, some of them repeatedly, besides the Bible, "The Pilgrim's 
Progress," "Robinson Crusoe," ".Esop's Fables," a History of the United States, and Weems's 
"Life of Washington." In connection with the last-named book he 
had a queer experience which will be described in another story. 

As candles were scarce and costly, Abraham read and studied by 
the firelight until far into the night. With a piece of charcoal he would 
cipher on a wide wooden shovel and erase his figures by shaving the 
shovel clean with his father's drawknife. Whenever he found anything 
in his voracious reading that he wished to preserve, he would write 
it on smooth board, on the under sides of chairs and shelves, and leave 
his odd notes there until he could supply himself with paper which 
he made into a rough kind of "commonplace book" and copied into 
it the data and quotations from their queer hiding places, high on the 
walls or under the benches and stools. He used to talk over what 
he had read, sometimes with his mother, sometimes with those of his 
companions who were interested. 

His stepmother, not long before her death, referring to this time 
in the life of Abraham Lincoln, said: 

I can say what scarcely one mother in a thousand can say : Abe never gave 
me a cross word or look, and never refused in fact or appearance to do any- 
thing I asked him. His mind and mine — what little I had— seemed to run to- 
gether. I had a son John, who was raised with Abe. Both were good boys, but 

I must say, both being now dead, that Abe was the best boy I ever saw or expect He rew] and studied by the tireli£ht 
'° *^*- until far into the night 




I9IO 



MARCH— APRIL 



1910 



SUN. 



MON. 



TUES. 



WED. 



THUR. 



27 28 29 30 31 



FRI. 



SAT. 



m' 



THE LINCOLN 




STORY-CALENDAR 



WORKING FOR THE CRAWFORDS 




OSIAH CRAWFORD was a well-to-do farmer in the neighborhood. He was not 
well liked by the neighbors, whose children called him Old Blue-Nose for an 
obvious reason. Abraham had an experience with him in connection with 
Weems's "Life of Washington." The boy had borrowed it and. after readmg it 
as long as he could see, tucked it into a chink in the wall between two logs over 
his bed, to be at it again as soon as it was light enough in the morning. But 
a driving rainstorm came up in the night, wet the mud-mortar plastered m be- 
tween the logs and muddy water ran over the book almost ruimng it. Abe 
was in sad straits. What could he say to "Old Blue-Nose," who was considered 
a hard master. He went to Mr. Crawford (who must not be confused wih 
Andrew Crawford, the schoolmaster) and frankly confessed that the book was badly damaged, but 
he would do anything he could to make good the loss: 

"Ml ri"ht Abe seein' as it's you, I'll let you pay for it," said Mr. Crawford. "That book's wuth seventy- 
five cents rf ii's Tuth a penny, and%ou can pull fodder for me three days at twenty-five cents a day for it. 

S~'ot (S nk= LSg?5 Sr.lw. So young Lincola did, ■• we .11 must .omCmes. .h. .,ry ,h,ng 

he would not have wished to do. ^, .. , , ., ^^^^ , ... 

Mrs. Elizabeth Crawford, Josiah's wife, has related some of the 
best stories we know of Abraham Lincoln's boyhood. She says: 

Abe was a sensitive lad, never coming where he was not wanted^ He 
liked to hang about the house and talk with the "women folks He was 
handy about the house, getting up early, starting the fire, putting on the 
kettle and getting the breakfast going, before the rest were up He would 
rock ihe baby or help his sister or his mistress m any way h? <=°j" ^^ „ "^ j 
Crawford tells that "Abe was tender-hearted and kind like his sister and 
that he always lifted his poor old hat in saluting ladies He was full of 
fu^ and Ks joking. The greatest joke of all was that he meant, one 

•^"'•"A prett^-Tr^ident you'd make, with all your nonsense, Abe Lincoln," 

"''^-ni'ga'r'idf and the time will come," laughed the big boy. as he 
strode away as fast as his long legs would carry him. 




The Home of the Crawfordi 



I9IO 

SUN. 

3 



MON. 

4 



APRIL 

TUES. WED. THUR. 

5 6 7 



FRI. 

8 



1910 

SAT. 

9 



w 



THE LINCOLN 




STORY-CALENDAR 



ABE'S AMUSEMENTS 




T has been told herein that Abraham was too tender-hearted to enjoy gunning, 
and how he shut himself out of the exciting part of the society spelling-bees — 
but there were many sports in which he was a jolly participant. He went swim- 
ming and fishing with the other boys of Pigeon Creek. There may have been a 
certain childish inconsistency in fishing — just as if fish "hadn't feelin's," like the 
ants and terrapin he had saved from cruelty at the hands of other boys! Yet, 
even then his young mind seemed to distinguish between wanton and cruel sport 
and legitimate fishing and hunting for food. 

Then there was coon hunting — the rarest night sport of all country and back- 
woods youth. A story is told of the sad fate of a "trifling" little yellow dog Thomas Lincoln insisted 
on keeping around the house, to the annoyance of Abraham and his stepbrother, John Johnston, as it 
always barked and made a fuss, warning the household when the boys were trying to steal out, un- 
noticed, to go for an all-night escapade after coons. One night they caught the little cur and took it 
along in self-defense. After the party had killed a coon, one of them, in sportive vein, proposed that 
they sew the yellow nuisance up in the coon's skin. Of course, that was "just the thing to do," and 
the boys were not long in transforming the little beast into a queer "coon-dog." As soon as it 
was released, the dog started for home as fast as its little legs, hampered by the coon-pelt, would 
let it go. The boys laughed among themselves over the astonishment and disgust Thomas Lincoln 
would show when he got up to let in that strange-looking, whining whiffet. But that unhappy com- 
bination never reached home. Other coon-dogs, on the way, didn't 
understand the joke and made short work of the disguised dog in 
its own door yard. Mr. Lincoln used to tell of this boyish prank, 
to which he was doubtless a party, and once said of the after effect 
early next morning: 

"Father was much incensed at his death, but as John and I, 
scantily protected from the morning wind, stood shivering in the 
doorway, we felt assured that little yellow Joe would never be able 
again to sound the alarm of another coon hunt." 

Then, as he grew older, there were fox-chases and horse-races, 
husking-bees and house and barn-raisings, where his "horse sense," 
good nature, funny stories and great strength made him popular and 
a leader in the neighborhood. He was shy and awkward with 
women, but was always "hail, fellow, well met!" among men. 
When he "went to see the girls," he was always welcome, because 
of his wit and quaint humor; and he added greatly to the enjoy- ^•v 
ment of all — paring apples, cracking nuts and shelling corn. Then"^" 
he always brought in the biggest backlog and made the brightest 
fire. They all agreed that Abe Lincoln would "get a smart wife" 
when the right time came. ^^^ ^^ ^^^ ,„, ^„„. 










I9I0 



APRIL 



1910 



SUN. 



10 



MON. 



II 



TUES. 



12 



WED. 



THUR. 



ERI. 



SAT. 



13 14 15 16 



THE LINCOLN 




STORY-CALENDAR 



LINCOLN'S FIRST LOVE STORY 




NCE President Lincoln, after sitting a long while with a pensive 
smile and a far-away look in his eyes, asked a friend: 

"Did you ever write out a story in your mind? I did when 
I was a little codger. One day a wagon with a lady and two girls 
and a man broke down near us, and while they were fixing up, they 

cooked in our kitchen. The woman had books and read us stories, and they were 

the first of the kind I ever had heard. I took a great fancy to one of the girls; 

and when they were gone I thought of her a great deal, and one day when I 

was sitting out in the sun by the house, I wrote out a story in my mind. I thought 

I took my father's horse and followed the wagon, and finally I found it, and they 

were surprised to see me. I talked with the girl and persuaded her to elope 

with me; and that night I put her on my horse, and we 

started off across the prairie. After several hours we came 

to a camp; and when we rode up we found it was the one 

we had left a few hours before, and we went in. 

"The next night we tried again, and the same thing 

happened — the horse came back to the same place; and 

then we concluded that we ought not to elope. I stayed 

until I had persuaded her father to give her to me. I always 

meant to write that story out and publish it, and I began 

once; but I concluded it was not much of a story. 

"But I think that was the beginning of love with me." 










w' 



* Sitting' oui in the lun by 
the home " 



I9IO 



APRIL 



1910 



SUN. 



MON. 



TUES. 



WED. 



THUR. 



FRI. 



SAT. 



17 IS 19 20 21 22 23 



1^ 



THE LINCOLN 




STORY-CALENDAR 



LINCOLN'S MANUAL LABOR 




HE lad was a valuable asset in his father's family because of his great physical 
strength and endurance, and his abounding good nature. From the time he was 
fourteen he worked out as a hired hand with the farmers around the Pigeon 
Creek settlement. He was willing and would "turn his hand to anything," from 
butchering hogs to rocking the baby. Once, when asked by a farmer if he 
could help butcher he replied: 

"I'll try. If you'll risk the hog I'll risk myself." 
In the haying and harvesting fields he could outmow and outcradle the 
other men, but he offset this by telling stories, making stump speeches, "taking off" anybody and 
everybody with the comic facility of a born mimic. The men all liked to have Abe working with 
them, for he was full of life and his funny stories relieved the tedium of the long work-day. But 
it annoyed his employers to see all the hay hands standing or lying around a stump in the middle 
of a meadow while "that Abe Lincoln" was spouting and performing. They complained to the 
lad's father, who used to reproach his tall son not only for wasting his own time, but for "hinder- 
ing the help." Thomas Lincoln took and kept the boy's wages until he was twenty-one. These 
were not large, ranging from twenty-five to thirty cents a day. 

The neighbors told tales of Abe Lincoln's feats which surpass 
belief, but each story was vouched for by many witnesses. Mr. 
Richardson, the neighbor for whom Lincoln had set the "Good boys 
who to their books appljr" copy, stated that "Abe quietly picked up 
and walked away with a covered chicken-house, made of poles pinned 
together, that weighed at least six hundred, if not more." Another 
time he alone took up four timbers for a corncrib which four men 
were preparing to remove, shouldered and carried them to the place 
desired. Another neighbor said "Abe could strike a heavier blow with 
a maul and drive an ax deeper into the wood than any other man" 
he ever saw; and Dennis Hanks said that when Abe was heard 
chopping in the woods the trees fell so fast that one would think 
three men were chopping there. 

With all this Lincoln was called "lazy," because he "wasted so 
much time reading." Those farmers had limited ideas of work, and 

no one realized that jolly, joking Abraham Lincoln was the hardest •• Th.t Abe Lincoln •• w« .pouiiog 
worker of them alL and performing 




I9IO 



APRIL 



1910 



SUN. 



MON. 



TUES. 



WED. 



THUR. 



FRI. 



SAT. 



24 25 26 27 28 29 30 



^., 



THE LINCOLN 




STORY-CALENDAR 



HIS KINDNESS OF HEART AND HIS FIRST 

DOLLAR 




IS great strength was not for use only in the fields and at "raisings." One cold 
night, coming home late from threshing, Abraham and some friends found the 
village sot frozen into a mudhole by the roadside. The young men did their 
best to rouse him, but without success. 

"Come on, boys," said one, "he's feathered his own nest, let him lie in it. 

Let 'im alone," and the others went home and to bed. But the idea of leaving 

even a drunkard to die in the ditch seemed monstrous to Lincoln. He bent his 

great form and carried the dead weight of that great heavy man eighty yards to 

an empty hut, where he spent the rest of the night, building a fire and rubbing 

and nursing the man back to consciousness. The victim of this intemperate habit was afterwards 

a great admirer of Lincoln, and often told how Abe Lincoln had "toted" him to a warm fire that 

cold night and saved his life. 

It was about this time (1825) that Abraham Lincoln acted as ferryman across the Ohio, in the 
employ of James Taylor, at the mouth of Anderson's Creek, where he worked nine months at six 
dollars a month. While he was a ferryman he had some time to read, and built himself a flatboat, 
for he had a great desire, at this time, to "follow the river." One day, as he told Secretary Seward 
nearly forty years afterward, he earned his first dollar. Here is the rest of the story in President 
Lincoln's own words: 

A steamer was going down the river. We have, you know, no wharves on the western streams, and the 
custom was, if passengers were at any of the landings they had to go out in a boat, the steamer stopping 
and taking them on board. I was contemplating my new boat, and wondering whether I could make it stronger 
or improve it in any part, when two men with trunks came down to the shore in car- 
riages, and looking at the different boats, singled out mine, and asked : 

"Who owns this?" 

I answered modestly, "I do." 

"Will you," said one of them, "take us and our trunks out to the steamer?" 

"Certainly," said I. I was very glad to have the chance of earning something 
for myself, and supposed that each of them would give me a couple of "bits." The 
trunks were put in ray boat, the passengers seated themselves on them, and I 
sculled them out to the steamer. They got on board, and I lifted the trunks and 
put them on the deck. The steamer was about to put on steam again, when I 
called out : 

"You have forgotten to pay me." 

Each of them took from his pocket a silver half-dollar and threw it on the 
bottom of my boat. I could scarcely believe my eyes as I picked up the money. 
You may think it was a very little thing, and in these days it seems to me like a 
trifle, but it was a most important incident in my life. I could scarcely credit that 
I, a poor boy, had earned a dollar in less than a day ; that by honest work I had 
earned a dollar. I was a more hopeful and thoughtful boy from that time. Abe Lincoln 




I9IO 



MAY 



1910 



SUN. 



MON. 



TUES. 



WED. 



THUR. 



FRI. 



SAT. 



THE LINCOLN 




STORY-CALENDAR 



HIS STEPSISTER AND HIS OWN SISTER 




NE morning Abe was going into the woods with an ax over his shoulder. His 
stepsister, Matilda Johnston, had seemed so "possessed" to follow him about 
that her mother had to forbid her even going part way with him to his work. 
But she stole after him virithout his noticing it. When they were some distance 
from the house she crept up slyly behind him, and, springing like a wildcat, 
landed on his back, pressing her knees between his shoulders. The astonished 
young man, taken o£F his guard, fell over backwards, and the falling ax cut the 
girl's ankle. The mischievous Matilda, seeing the blood flow freely, began to 
scream with fright and pain. Abe took a piece of cotton from his shirt-sleeve, made a bandage, 
and bound up the wound as well as he could. Then he addressed her, sternly: 

" 'Tilda, I am astonished. What do you mean by disobeying mother in this way?" The girl 
only wept. He continued: "What are you going to tell mother — about getting hurt?" 
"Tell her I did it with the ax — and I did, didn't I?" blubbered Matilda. 

"Yes," said Abe, "that's the truth, but not all the truth. Tell mother the whole story and leave 
the rest to her." 

Matilda went limping home and told her mother "the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but 
the truth," and the good woman felt so sorry for the penitent girl that she didn't even scold her. 
Abe had evidently done enough of that. ., 

Abraham's own sister Sarah, or Nancy, as she was called after ^ 1^}' 
Sarah Johnston came into the family, was warmly attached to her 
tall brother. She had great faith in his mind and heart, even at that «^i 
early day, taking the place, as older sister, of their own dead mother. n„ " 
She was greatly beloved by those who knew her. Mrs. Josiah Craw- ' ■ ' 
ford's highest praise of Abe was that he was good, polite and kind 
hearted, "like his sister." She was married at eighteen to Aaron 
Grigsby, one of the older pupils at the school which the Lincoln chil- 
dren both attended. She died a year later, at the age of nineteen, in 
giving birth to a child. She was buried, not beside her mother, but 
with the Grigsbys, in the graveyard of the old Pigeon Creek meeting- 
house. Abraham was devoted to his only sister. It was her presence ^■■*'''^"^. ■tl'fe^ 
at the Crawfords that reconciled him to working for "Old Blue-Nose." --^ =^?^*?^S^^^#i«t^"^te» 
The loss of his sister was the second great sorrow of Abraham Lin- "^^ 

coin's life. She crept up ilyty behind him 




I9IO 



MAY 



1910 



SUN. 

8 



MON. 



TUES. 



WED. 



10 II 



THUR. 



12 



FRI. 



SAT. 



13 14 



»v 



THE LINCOLN 




STORY-CALENDAR 



"BOW-HAND ON A BROAD-HORN" 




BE had long since given up the idea of earning a living behind the counter of 
Jones's store, or any other that he knew of. He was under bonds to his 
father, but he made an attempt to obtain employment as a boat-hand on the 
river. His age was against him in his first effort, but his opportunity was com- 
ing to him. In the month of March, 1828, he hired himself to Mr. Gentry, the 
great man of Gentryville. His duties were to be mainly performed at Gentry's 
Landing, near Rockport, on the Ohio River. There was a great enterprise on 
foot, or rather in the water, at Gentry's Landing, for a flatboat belonging to 
the proprietor was loading with bacon and other produce for a trading trip down the Mississippi 
to New Orleans. She was to be under the command of young Allen Gentry, but would never re- 
turn to the Ohio, for flatboats are built to go down with the stream and not for pulling against it. 

The flatboat was cast loose from her moorings in April, and swept away down the river, with 
Abraham Lincoln as manager of the forward oar. No such craft ever had a longer or stronger pair 
of arms pledged to keep her blunt nose well directed. 

At the plantation of Madame Duchesne, six miles below Baton Rouge, the flatboat was moored 
for the night against the landing, and the keepers were sound asleep in their little kennel of a 
cabin. They slept until the sound of stealthy footsteps on the deck aroused Allen Gentry, and 
he sprang to his feet. There could be no doubt as to the cause of the disturbance. A gang of 
negroes had boarded the boat for plunder, and they would think lightly enough, now they were 
discovered, of knocking the two traders on the head and throwing them into the river. 
"Bring the guns, Abe!" shouted Allen. "Shoot them!" 
The intruders were not to be scared away by even so 
alarming an outcry; and in an instant more Abe was 
among them, not with a gun, but with a serviceable club. 
They fought well, and one of them gave their tall enemy 
a wound, the scar of which he carried -with him to his 
grave; but his strength and agility were too much for 
them. He beat them all off the boat, not killing any one 
man, but convincing the entire party that they had boarded 
the wrong "broad-horn." 

The trip lasted about three months, going and coming, 
and in June the two adventurers were at home again, well 
satisfied vrith their success. 

As related by W. O. Stoddard, the well-known author, and Abr«h«n Lincoln u muB^er of the for- 

only surviving private secretary to President Lincoln. ward om 




I9IO 



MAY 



1910 



SlUN. 



MON. 



tue:s. 



WED. 



THUR. 



FRI. 



SAT. 



8> 16 17 18 19 



20 21 



THE LINCOLN 




STORY.CALENDAR 



FROM INDIANA TO ILLINOIS 




ERY soon after Abraham's return from New Orleans one of the family received 
a letter from John Hanks, setting forth the attractions of that part of Illinois, 
where he had located two years earlier, and advising them to sell out and 
emigrate thither. Thomas Lincoln had lived near Gentryville fourteen years, 
which was a long time for him to stay in one place. Dennis Hanks accounted 
for this removal, making himself out, as usual, the hero of his own story, as 
follows: 

What made Thomas Lincoln leave? The reason is this. We were perplexed by a 
disease called "milk-sick." I myself being the oldest, I was determined to leave, and hunt 
a countrj' where the milk-sick was not. I married his oldest (step) daughter. I sold out, and they concluded 
to go with me. I was tolerably popular at that time, for I had some money. My wife's mother (Sarah Bush 
Lincoln) could not think of parting with her daughter, and we ripped up stakes and started to Illinois, and 
landed at Decatur. This is the reason for leaving Indiana. I am to blame for it, if any. As for getting 
more land, this was not the case, for we could have entered ten thousand acres of the best land. When we 
left, it is was on account of the milk. I had four — good milch cows, too — with it, and eleven young calves. 
This was enough to ruin me. Besides, I liked to have lossed my own life with it. This was reason enough 
(ain't it?) for leaving. 

It was in the early spring of 1S30, before winter had fairly broken up, that Thomas Lincoln and Abe, 
Dennis Hanks and Levi Hall, who was, like Dennis, a distant cousin, and had married one of Abe's stepsisters, 
— thirteen in all — took the road for Illinois. Thomas Lincoln had sold, or let his farm go on the mortgage, to 
Mr. Gentry, and sold his com and hogs to Dave Tumham. The goods of the three families — Lincoln. Hanks 
and Hall — were loaded on a wagon belonging to Lincoln. It was drawn by four yoke of oxen, two yoke of 
Lincoln's and two of Hank's. Abe "held the gad" and drove the eight-ox team. 

It was on this journey across muddy prairies and swollen streams that a little dog belonging to one 
of the party was left behind on the other side of an icy stream. Of this incident Abraham once said: 

I could not endure the idea of abandoning even a dog. Pulling 
off shoes and socks. I waded across the stream and triumphantly 
returned with the shivering animal under my arm. His frantic leaps 
of joy and other evidences of a dog's gratitude amply repaid me for 
the exposure I had undergone. 

John Hanks met the movers with a hearty welcome anc. 
logs enough ready for their cabin, which the six men of the 
party "raised" without outside help, since Abe counted for 
three men on such occasions. Nicolay and Hay have given the 
follovring account of young Lincoln's efforts to settle his old , 
father and stepmother: 

With the assistance of John Hanks he plowed fifteen acres, and 
split, from the tall walnut trees of the primeval forest, enough rails 
to surround them with a fence. Little did either dream, while . 
engaged in this work, that the day would come when John Hanks, 
in a public meeting, with two of these rails on his shoulder, would 
electrify a State convention, and kindle throughout the country a 
contagious and passionate enthusiasm whose results would reach to 
endless generations. 




The Lincolns* first home in lUinou 



I9IO 



MAY 



191O 



SUN. 



22 



MON. 



TUES. 



WED. 



THUR. 



FRI. 



SAT. 



23 24 25 26 27 28 



THE LINCOLN 




STORY-CALENDAR 




MEMORIAL DAY 

WOMAN IN THE WAR 

GREAT fair was holding in the Patent Office building just before 
the close of the War, for the benefit of the soldiers. President Lin- 
coln was deeply interested visitor and was asked, while in attend- 
ance, if he would like to "say a few words of encouragement to 
the ladies." "Indeed he would," and when escorted to the plat- 
form he expressed his sentiments as follows, in the course of an offhand but 
memorable speech: 

"In this extraordinary war, extraordinary developments have manifested 
themselves, such as have not been seen in former wars ; and among these mani- 
festations nothing has been more remarkable than these fairs for the relief of 
suffering soldiers and their families. And the chief agents 
in these fairs are the women of America. 

"I am not accustomed to use the language of eulogy; 
I have never studied the art of paying compliments to 
women; but I must say that if all that has been said by 
orators and poets since the creation of the world, in praise 
of women, were applied to the women of America, it 
would not do them justice for their conduct during the 
war. I will close by saying: 

"God bless the Women of America !' " * ''°''"*'"Jt°h'«'be«d'' '"'°'° 




I9IO 



MAY— JUNE 



1910 



SUN. 



MON. 



TUES. 



WED. 



THUR. 



29 30 31 



FRI. 



SAT 



^y 



THE LINCOLN 




STORY-CALENDAR 



A STORY OF THE REMOVAL, AND STARTING 
OUT FOR HIMSELF 




LTHOUGH Abraham had attained his majority before their removal to Illinois, 
he stayed by and did all the hard work getting his father and stepmother com- 
fortably placed before starting out in life for himself. As his stepmother had a 
son of her own and two sons-in-law, he might well have excused himself, espe- 
cially as his father had been harsh and hard with him, requiring all his earnings 
up to the very day he was twenty-one. Thomas Lincoln had always been more 
lenient with his stepchildren than with Abraham, for he never ceased to think 
his son's persistence in reading and study "jest pure laziness." In excuse for 
the father it may be said that, by being kind to his wife's children, he recipro- 
cated the considerateness she always showed his children. 
Before leaving Indiana, Abraham bought a peddler's stock of small wares, paper, thread, 
needles, and so forth — about thirty dollars' worth, he afterwards said — and "doubled his money." 
He seems to have turned over that thirty dollars, though made after his twenty-first birthday, 
for, when he started out for himself, he had no money nor even a "freedom suit" of jeans, for 
the first thing he did then was to split rails for enough walnut-dyed jeans to make a suit of 
clothes for himself, at four hundred rails per yard! As "his body was long and lank and lean" 
it took thousands of rails to pay for the poor majority suit of homespun he so much needed. 

Long years afterward, when his Cabinet was struggling with the question of the interference 
of Europe in the quarrel with the Southern States, President Lincoln related the following incident: 

"Gentlemen," said he, addressing those seated around the Cabinet table, "the situation just now reminds 
me of a fix I got into some thirty years ago when I was peddling 'notions' on the way from Indiana to 
Illinois. I didn't have a large stock, but I charged large prices, and I made money. Perhaps you don't see 
what I'm driving at. . . . Just before we left Indiana we came across a small farmhouse full of children. 
These ranged in age from seventeen years to seventeen months, and all 
were in tears. The mother of the family was red-headed and red-faced, 
and the whip she held in her right hand led to the inference that she had 
been chastising her brood. The father of the family, a meek-looking, 
mild-mannered, tow-headed chap, was standing in the front door, to all 
appearances awaiting his turn. ... I thought there wasn't much use in 
asking the head of that house if she wanted any 'notions.' She was too 
busy. . . . She saw me when I came up and, roughly pushing her husband 
aside, demanded my business. 

"Nothing, ma'am," I answered as gently as possible. "I merely dropped 
in, as I came along, to see how things were going." 

"Well, you needn't wait," she said in an irritated way ; "there's trouble 
here, and lots of it, too, but I kin manage my own affairs without the help 
of outsiders. This is jest a family row, but I'll learn these brats their 
places ef I have to lick the hide off every one of 'em. I don't do much 
talkin', but I run this house, an' I don't want no one sneakin' round tryin' ' 
to find out how I do it, either." 

"That's the case here with us," continued the President. "We must let 
the other nations know that we propose to settle our family row in our 
own way, and teach these brats (the seceding States') their places, and 
we don't want any other countries 'sneakin' round.' Now, Seward, write 
some diplomatic notes to that effect." 




■^^■^^%^^: 



Splitting rails for his "freedom suit* 



I9IO 



JUNE 



1910 



SUN. 



MON. 



TUES. 



WED. 



8 



THUR. 



TRI. 



10 



SAT. 



II 



THE LINCOLN 




STORY-CALENDAR 



A STRANGE HERO SAVES THREE LIVES 




HE dutiful and forgiving son hovered about, doing any odd work he could find 
in that neighborhood, in order to be near his father's family. In the fall they 
wrere all seized with fever and ague and felt as though they had made a poor 
exchange for the "milk-sick." Thomas Lincoln vowed that as soon as he was 
able he'd "git out o' thar!" He did move again, to Coles County, the following 
spring. Their first winter in Illinois was a terrible season, always referred to 
for many years as "the winter of the deep snow." It was bitterly cold also, and 
many of the people and cattle of that sparsely settled country either froze or 
starved to. death. 

Early in the spring of 1831, Abraham, John Hanks and John Johnston were 
engaged by a "merchant-adventurer," named Offutt, to build a boat to take corn, hogs and pork in 
barrels to sell in New Orleans. This was Lincoln's second trip to the Crescent City. On the way 
their flatboat caught on Rutledge's dam at New Salem, and the first sight the people of that village 
ever had of the young man who afterwards lived among them for six years was while he was 
making a new and ingenious device for getting the boat over the dam, and wading about "with his 
trousers rolled up five feet, more or less," while doing it. It was on this trip that he was said to 
have seen a beautiful octoroon girl sold in open market, and to have exclaimed about slavery: 
"If I ever get a chance at that thing I'll hit it hard!" 

While building this flatboat Lincoln became very popular with the men living along the San- 
gamon river by telling his funny stories. It took a month to build the boat, so he told a great 
many, morning, noon and night. Before they launched the boat the spring freshet had raised the 
Sangamon till it overflowed the surrounding prairies and was "booming at a great rate." Two of 
the men got into the swift current in a "dugout" canoe and would have drowned but for Lincoln's 
wise and ready directions from the shore. They had just managed to climb into a tree when the 
"dugout" was torn away from them by the swift current. A young man tried to rescue them by 
floating out upon a log tied by a long rope to the bank, all under 
the management of Lincoln, but the venturesome youth only added 
himself to the number in the tree to be rescued by the newcomer's 
ingenuity and courage. 

John Roll, one of the young men who worked with Lincoln, 
thus tells the close of the thrilhng story in Miss Tarbell's "Life 
of Abraham Lincoln": 

The excitement on shore increased, and almost the whole population 
of the village gathered on the river bank. Lincoln had the log pulled 
up the stream, and. securing another piece of rope, called to the men in 
the tree to catch it if they could when he should reach the tree. He then 
straddled the log himself and gave the word to push out into the stream. 
When he dashed into the tree he threw the rope over the stump of a broken 
limb, and let it play until he broke the speed of the log. and gradually drew 
it back to the tree, holding it there until the three now nearly frozen men 
had climbed down and seated themselves astride. He then gave orders to the 
people on the shore to hold fast to the end of the rope which was tied to 
the log. and leaving his rope in the tree he turned the log adrift. The force 
of the current, acting against the taut rope, swung the log around against 
the bank and all 'on beard' were saved. 

The excited people, who had watched the dangerous experiment with 
alternate hope and fear, now broke into cheers for Abe Lincoln, and praises 
for his brave act. This adventure made quite a hero of him along the 
Sangamon, and the people never tired of telling of the exploit. 






r 







;h^' 



^-^fe-^.: 



* He threw the rope over ' 



I9IO 



JUNE 



1910 



SUN. 



12 



MON. 



TUES. 



WED. 



THUR. 



FRI. 



SAT. 



13 14 15 16 17 IS 



%.. 



THE LINCOLN 




STORY-CALENDAR 




HOW THE ARMSTRONGS BECAME LINCOLN'S 

FRIENDS AND HOW HE REPAID 

THEIR KINDNESS 

N his way back to Illinois Lincoln visited his father in the new home at Goose- 
nest Prairie in Coles County, Illinois. While there the county champion, named 
Needham, challenged him to a wrestling match. Lincoln threw Needham twice, 
hurting the champion's body less than his pride. 

"Lincoln," said he, "you have thrown me twice, but you can't whip me." 
"Needham," said Abraham, "are you satisfied that I can throw you? If not, 
and if you still want to be convinced by means of a thrashing, I will do that, 
just to please you." 

But Needham did not insist on further punishing, even for his own good! 
When Lincoln returned to New Salem, where he was to open a country store for Offutt as 
soon as the purchased goods arrived, he hung about while waiting, telling stories and making 
himself useful. Once he helped the election clerk. Mentor Graham, the schoolmaster, who after- 
wards advised and aided him in studjring grammar and surveying. When Offutt's stock finally 
arrived, Lincoln had already made a good many friends to his own and his employer's advantage. 
Offutt was loud in his praises of his wonderful salesman, and this brought down a challenge from 
a group of rowdies from Clary's Grove, a neighboring settlement. 

Their chief bully, Armstrong, was put forward to meet the strange clerk. Lincoln hated 
above all things to get into a brawl, but Offutt's and his own honor appeared to be at stake. A 
ring was marked out, and the two seemed about evenly matched, until some of the lawless gang, 
outside the ring, tried to trip Lincoln up. Stung to wrath by this unfair act, the tall clerk "put 
forth his whole strength, and, holding the pride of Clary's Grove in his arms like a child, almost 
choked the exuberant life out of him." This insured him greater respect among those rude, simple 
folk than he could have gained in any other way. As for the Clary's Grove rowdies, they became 
Lincoln's staunch friends, and followed him as their leader about 
the country, when he went into politics, to see that no one 
imposed upon him. 

Lincoln often stayed at Armstrong's when he was out of fi\ 



work, rocking the cradle of William and Hannah Armstrong's ^^^ 



baby boy. This little fellow, when he grew up, was accused 
of murder, and Lincoln, then a lawyer, defended his case, 
winning a verdict of acquittal by a clever stroke. It was a 
celebrated and dramatic case. He drew the chief witness on 
to testify that he saw Armstrong strike the murderous blow, 
by moonlight, at a certain hour, then flashed upon the court 
an almanac showing that there was no moon at that hour. 
This discredited all the evidence against his client and young 
Armstrong was soon set free. Lawyer Lincoln would accept 
no pay for this great service from those who had been kind to 
him in New Salem. 







At the Armstrong; trial 



I9IO 



JUNE 



1910 



SUN. 



MON. 



19 20 



TUES. 



21 



WED. 



THUR. 



FRI. 



SAT. 



22 23 24 25 



%iii 



THE LINCOLN 




STORY-CALENDAR 



"HONEST ABE " LINCOLN 




T was while clerking for Offutt that Abraham Lincoln began to be called "Honest 
Abe." Many stories are told of his walking miles after shutting up the store 
at night, or early in the morning before opening it, to give a woman an ounce 
or two of tea, or a few pennies which he found to be her due. 

Offutt soon failed and disappeared only to be heard of again as a horse 
trainer, when his former clerk had become famous. Then Lincoln worked at 
anything he could get to do till an opportunity offered for him to go into part- 
nership with a young man named Berry, who drank himself to death, while 
Lincoln was reading a set of "Blackstone" he had found in a barrel of old rub- 
bish. Lincoln tried to carry on the business with the incubus of a drunken 
partner. But, after all, the store "winked out," as its owner whimsically expressed it, leaving Lin- 
coln with a lot of notes on his hands which he never should have paid, and which custom and 
public sentiment did not require him to pay. But he had agreed to take them up and the obliga- 
tion, so large that he ruefully called it "The National Debt," burdened him for nearly twenty years 
before he had paid "the uttermost farthing" of principal and interest. 

While he was storekeeping for himself he was appointed postmaster of New Salem. This 
office paid a very small salary, but the postmaster was allowed to read the newspapers before 
delivering them, which was a "perquisite" highly appreciated by the young postmaster, hungry 
for news and knowledge of the great world around him. 

Surveying, also, was added to his labors. Being offered a chance to become deputy to the 
county surveyor, he procured a copy of Flint and Gibson, and, with the aid of Schoolmaster Graham, 
mastered the science of surveying in a few weeks. He laid out many of the towns of central 
Illinois, and in some villages all business closed in order that the delighted denizens could go out 
into the fields to help Surveyor Lincoln, in order to hear and 
laugh over his many quips and jokes and stories. 

While Lincoln was acting as deputy surveyor a creditor, 
holding an old store note, seized his horse and surveying in- 
struments and, as he could not then pay the notes, sold him out. 
A friend bought the necessaries in and returned them to their 
struggling owner. 

After the young storekeeper, postmaster and surveyor had 
become a "starving attorney" in Springfield, and the New Salem 
post office and even the village had gone out of existence, an 
officer of the government came into the office and asked for the 
man who had once been postmaster of New Salem, as he had a 
claim against that office for seventeen dollars and some odd 
cents. The friends who overheard the inquiry were alarmed, for 
they knew of the poverty and hardships Lincoln had lately passed 
through. 

But the poor young attorney went in silence to a corner of 
the office, pulled out his little old trunk from under the lounge 
on which he slept, took out a cotton rag, opened it and counted 
out the exact sum required by the government, paying it over 
to the official in the very coins he had received years before in 
New Salem, and saying briefly: 

"I never use anybody's money but my own." The very coinj he had received 




I9IO 



JUNE>-JULY 



1910 



SUN. 



MON. 



TUES. 



WED. 



THUR. 



26 27 28 29 30 



FRI. 



SAT. 



THE LINCOLN 




STORY-CALENDAR 



INDEPENDENCE DAY 



PRESIDENT LINCOLN'S SPEECH TO THE SLAVES IN RICHMOND 




N the 4th of April, 1865, President Lincoln walked through the streets of Rich- 
mond, leading his son "Tad." He was escorted only by Admiral Porter and 
a few sailors who had rowed him from the steamboat a little way out in the James 
river. The leading white people had fled, leaving the Confederate capital 
occupied mostly by negroes. One of the oldest of these, working near the 
wharf when the President's little party landed, immediately recognized Abra- 
ham Lincoln's grand, homely face and prostrated himself at the President's 
feet, crying: "Bress de Lord, dere is de great Messiah! I knowed him as soon 
as I seed him." This outcry attracted others, and still others, until the President's way was 
blocked on all sides by slaves swarming around from all directions. At last the great Emanci- 
pator gave them the following announcement and fatherly advice: 

"My poor friends, you are free — free as air. You can cast off the name of 
slave and trample upon it; it will come to you no more. 
Liberty is your birthright. God gave it to you as he gave 
it to others, and it is a sin that you have been deprived of 
it for so many years. 

"But you must try to deserve this priceless boon. 
Let the world see that you merit it, and are able to main- 
tain it by your good works. Don't let your joy carry you 
into excesses; learn the laws, and obey them. Obey 
God's commandments, and thank Him for giving you 
liberty, for to Him you owe all things. There, now, let 
me pass on ; I have but little time to spare. I want to 
see the Capitol [of the Confederacy] and must return at 
once to Washington to secure to you that liberty which 
you seem to prize so highly." ,„ ,h, „„,,. „, Richmond 




I9IO 



JULY 



1910 



SUN. 



MON. 



TUE^S. 



WED. 



THUR. 



FRI. 

8 



SAT. 



w 



THE LINCOLN 




STORY-CALENDAR 



BEGINNINGS IN LAW AND POLITICS 




FTER finding a set of "Blackstone" in an old barrel he had bought of a traveler 
who did not care to keep it longer, Lincoln began to study law in the "uni- 
versity of adversity." As a boy he had enjoyed the "Revised Statutes of Indiana" 
when nothing better to read was at hand. At one time he had yearned to be 
a deckhand on the Ohio, and even thought seriously, at several points in his 
career, of learning the blacksmith's trade, but that "Blackstone" proved a 
"treasure trove" to him and exerted a providential influence upon his life. While 
in the Black Hawk War he met Major John T. Stuart, of Springfield, with whom 
he was afterward associated in the State Assembly. Stuart advised and aided 
Lincoln in his law studies, lending him books, and finally offering to take him 
into partnership as soon as he could be admitted to the bar. 

Of course the popular and public spirited young law student took to politics "as a duck takes 
to water." He was diffident and disparaged his own qualifications, but his friends advised him to 
"go in and win." Schoolmaster Graham suggested that he would better study grammar, so he 
walked six miles, borrowed Kirkham's, and came back before breakfast, having learned his first 
lesson, six miles long, or all the way back. His first political speech was as follows: 

Fellow-Citizens : I presume you all know who I am. I am humble Abraham Lincoln. I have been 
solicited by many of my friends to become a candidate for the Legislature My politics are "short and sweet, 
like an old woman's dance." I am in favor of a national bank. I am in favor of the international improve- 
ment system, and a high protective tariff. These are my sentitnents and political principles. If elected I will 
be thankful. If not, it will be all the same. 

It was "all the same," for the Black Hawk War came up, and Lincoln's patriotism got the 
better of his self-interest, so he enlisted and was defeated by the Rev. Peter Cartwright, the back- 
woods Methodist preacher, by a small plurality. But he was elected two years later and was re- 
elected many times to the State Assembly, in which he became the 
leading spirit of "the Long Nine," who accomplished the removal of 
the State capital from Vandalia to Springfield. 

One time the young lawyer from New Salem was invited to 
address a political meeting in Springfield. Mr. George Forquer, a 
wealthy and pompous resident of Springfield, who was said to have 
changed politics to get a fat land office, took it upon himself to humble 
the young upstart from the country. Lincoln had noticed a lightning- 
rod on Forquer's fine house, the first thing of the kind that had ever 
been seen there. So the young man from New Salem arose, a little 
pale, but with a smile and a significant glitter in his eye, and replied: 

"The gentleman commenced his speech by saying that this 'young man.' 
alluding to me, must be taken down. 1 am not so young in years as I am in 
the tricks and trades of a politician, but." said he. pointing to Forquer, "live 
long or die young, I would rather die now, than, like the gentleman, change 
my politics, and with the change receive an office worth three thousand dollars 
a year, and then feet obliged to erect a lightning-rod over my house to protect 
a guilty conscience from an offended God." 



Forquer's lightning-rod could not save his political future from 
being blasted by that thunderbolt. 




His first lesion, six miles lon£' 



I9IO 



JULY 



1910 



SUN. 



10 



MON. 



II 



tue:s. 



12 



WED. 



13 



THUR. 



FRI. 



SAT. 



14 15 16 



THE LINCOLN 




STORY-CALENDAR 



A NEW STORY OF LINCOLN IN THE BLACK 

HAWK WAR 




OT long after Abraham came to live in New Salem the Black Hawk War broke 
out, in the spring of 1832. He was one of the first to enlist and was elected 
captain of the Sangamon company in preference to a former employer of his 
who had slighted and treated him meanly. Lincoln stated, after he was elected 
President, that his election to this captaincy gave him more real pleasure than 
any other honor he ever received. He held the respect and esteem of his com- 
pany in spite of the fact that he was not well versed in the manual of arms 
and was once in disgrace, having his sword taken from him for having dis- 
charged firearms within limits. That Captain Lincoln should have been guilty 
of such an infraction of rules has puzzled several of his biographers and others. 
But the reason was given to the writer at Springfield, Illinois, during the Lincoln Centennial 
celebration, in February, 1909, by William T. Baker, popularly known as "Uncle Billy," of Bolivia, 
Illinois. Baker's father was a roadmaster in the Black Hawk War. The follovsring is "Uncle 
Billy's" account: 

My father was ordered to make a way for the men to cross a river, and he felled some black-walnut trees 
across, lopping off their branches on the far side of the stream. Most of the men had to cross on these logs, 
some of which were small and smooth, and some men fell into the water — among them Captain Lincoln. After 
they got across, the boys pitched their camp and went to sleep under their little dog-tents. After Lincoln had 
crawled under his — his head stuck out one side and his feet the other — he backed out and stood up, saying, 
"There ! I forgot to clean out my pistol." He thought he had wet the powder when he fell into the water. It 
was a little bull-dog pistol with a barrel so short he could ram the charge in with one of his long fingers. 
Snapping the trigger, the pistol went off — to his great astonishment. It was against the riiles, of course, to 
discharge any firearms then and there, so one of General Whitesides' 
who had fired. No one answered, and father, pointing up the little rise, 
said : "It sounded as if 'twas on up that way." But the orderly soon came 
running back, and Lincoln didn't like to see the fellow taking so much 
trouble, so he kind o' laughed, and showed the pistol, and said : "I fired 
this thing off by accident," and explained just how it happened. He 
thought, of course, it was wet after he had fallen into the water with 
it. So he had to take a light sentence — have his sword taken away a 
day or so for his carelessness. I've heard Abe Lincoln and father and 
General Whitesides talk over old times in the Black Hawk War at our 
house, and I don't believe the real reason for his discharging firearms 
and being disgraced for it was ever published. At least, I never saw 
it in print anywhere. 

Lincoln did not see a battle all summer long. He kept 
some of his men from killing a harmless old Indian as a spy. 
When his company was disbanded he re-enlisted as a private. 
It is often stated that Major Jefferson Davis mustered Lincoln 
out at the close of that war, but that is an error. They never 
met. When Lincoln returned to New Salem it was August and 
almost election time. He found that he was defeated for the 
Assembly. He mentioned with pride, nearly thirty years after- 
ward, that this was the only time he was ever defeated by direct 
vote of the people. 



orderlies came hurrying along, asking 




MM 



' The pistol went off '* 



I9IO 



JULY 



1910 



SUN. 



MON. 



TUES. 



WED. 



THUR. 



ERI. 



SAT. 



17 18 19 20 21 22 23 



t^ 



THE LINCOLN 




STORY-CALCNDAR 



THREE AFFAIRS OF THE HEART 




INCOLN once told a friend of the "beginning of love" with him. With all his 
love for people, for helpless creatures, and especially for the unfortunate, his 
love for women and his grief over their loss almost broke his great heart. 
Some of his biographers hint that he was more than half in love with Kate 
Robey, "the pretty girl of the settlement," whom he helped, by pantomime, in 
spelling the word defied. She married Allen Gentry, son of the leading man of 
the village — after he and Allen made their first trip to New Orleans. 

While living in New Sale mhe fell in love with Ann, the beautiful daughter 
of James Rutledge, who owned the mill and kept the tavern where Lincoln 
boarded part of the time. Ann was engaged to a young man named McNamar 
who had gone east to take care of his dying father. Some time after McNamar ceased writing to 
her Ann plighted her troth to Abraham, but the anxiety and humiliation of her first love's neglect 
was too much for her sensitive, high-strung nature, and she died of brain fever, in August, 1835. 
Her distracted lover was unnerved by his passionate grief. It was while he was in a morbid, half- 
insane frame of mind that he learned to love William Knox's lengthy poem entitled: "O, why should 
the spirit of mortal be proud?" 

Then he threw himself with greater zest than ever into politics, and success seemed to crown 
his every effort. Some time after this a friend in New Salem. Mrs. Bennett Able, tried to "make a 
match" between him and her sister Mary Owens, a "bluegrass beauty" from Kentucky. Lincoln 
seemed to think he had committed himself to marry this young woman, if she had been led to 
expect him to, and wrote her to that effect, giving her a rather discouraging outlook upon the future 
of a poor young attorney in the State capital. She, as became a young lady of spirit and good sense, 
released him from his supposed obligation and refused him outright. In his first relief over this 
release he wrote an impulsive and indiscreet letter to a friend who was thoughtless or malicious 
enough to permit it to get into print, greatly to the annoyance and 

grief of Lincoln and his family. ^^^ 

The great and final affair of his heart was with a bright and ,=»"'°^— 

witty young lady who came from Louisville, Kentucky, to live 
with her sister, the wife of Ninian W. Edwards, of Springfield, 
one of Lincoln's friends among "the Long Nine." This was Miss 
Mary Todd, a pretty cousin of his law-partner, John T. Stuart. 
She had from the first a great fascination for Abraham Lincoln, 
and they were soon betrothed. But "the course of true love never 
did run smooth." Lincoln was morbid and self-disparaging, 
and Miss Todd was high-strung and exacting, and the engage- 
ment was broken. Lincoln, in his distress and despair, visited his 
friend Speed, with whom he had lodged when he first came to 
Springfield, from Louisville, Kentucky, and tried to forget his 
over-mastering passion. But there was no other way but for 
their lives to be united. In his love and gallantry he fought — or 
was ready to fight — an absurd duel for her sake. Abraham Lincoln 

and Mary Todd were married in the beautiful home of Ninian W. ciobe T»vern. where t.e l ncolns firit 
Edwards, at Springfield, Illinois, on the 4th of November, 1842. lived after their marriage 




I9IO 



JULY 



1910 



SUN. 



MON. 



TUES. 



WED. 



THUR. 



FRI. 



SAT. 



24 25 26 27 28 29 30 



THE LINCOLN 




STORY-CALENDAR 



HOW THE LITTLE WIFE'S AMBITION SENT 
HIM TO CONGRESS 




RS. LINCOLN'S influence over her easy-going husband was soon observed. He 
had moved his goods and chattels from New Salem on a horse borrowed from 
Bowling Green, the bluff old Justice of the Peace before whom he had petti- 
fogged for practice, to Springfield, in March, 1837. The next month he was 
admitted to the Springfield bar. He roomed vyith his "friend in need" and "friend 
indeed," Joshua F. Speed, until he took the lounge and slept in Stuart & Lincoln's 
office. This office was over the courtroom. One night his friend Edwin D. Baker 
was speaking in the courtroom and said something which enraged the Webber 

brothers, newspaper men of Springfield. There was an uproar which caused Lincoln to raise the 

trap door, unnoticed below, and look down to see what was up. He took in the situation at a 

glance. They were trying to intimidate his friend. He swung himself down through the ceiling, 

landed beside Baker, seized the water-pitcher, and with a face blazing with indignation, he bran- 
dished it, demanding, above the clamor, that they allow the speaker the right to say what he pleased. 
"For shame!" he cried. "Isn't this a free country and haven't we all a right to free speech? 

The first man that lays hands on this speaker I'll smash this pitcher 

over his head." 

Quiet was quickly restored and Baker was permitted to proceed. 
After four years of partnership v^ith Stuart, Lincoln went in with 

Judge Stephen T. Logan, one of the best and most painstaking lawyers 

in Illinois. This copartnership was a high compliment to the young 

countryman. Here Lincoln began to take his work more seriously and 

carefully studied his cases, going to the root of every matter, a habit that 

stood him in good stead when he had the great questions of the country 

and of humanity to work out. While he was Logan's partner he was 

married. He had always been a kindly factotum and "wheel-horse" for 

the Whig party, letting all the official honors go elsewhere before his 

marriage. It took several years for the party to learn that Lincoln was 4^' 

to be reckoned with and that he was worthy of serious thought and 

recognition. This came about through Mrs. Lincoln's and the Edwards 

family's influence. After self-sacrificing and herculean labors in the "Log 

Cabin" campaign of 1840, and in '44 and '46, he was himself elected to 

Congress in '48, defeating the eccentric camp-meeting preacher, Peter 

Cartwright, who had beaten him in the race for the State Assembly 

sixteen years before. Those who knew the Lincolns used to say it was 

his little wife's ambition and confidence in her husband's great abilities He iwung himself down t> rough 

that sent him to Congress and finally made him President. the ceiling 




I9IO 



JULY— AUGUST 



1910 



SUN. 



31 



MON. 



I 



TUES. 



WED. 



THUR. 



FRI. 



SAT. 



THE LINCOLN 




STORY-CALENDAR 



AS A MEMBER OF CONGRESS 




N the Lower House of Congress Lincoln made but little impression, while 
Stephen A. Douglas, his greatest rival for thirty years, won high opinions in 
the Senate. Lincoln made some valuable acquaintances, among whom was 
Daniel Webster, and acquired a reputation as a story-teller and a jovial fellow 
to meet. He had given his first expression upon slavery about fifteen years 
before, in the Assembly at Vandalia, in what is known as "the Lincoln-Stone 
Protest," in which he and only one other member declared that "slavery is 
founded on injustice and bad policy." While in Congress Lincoln was greatly 
exercised because slaves were herded together and sold in a "negro livery 
stable" under the very shadow of the Capitol. He formulated and reported a 
bill for abolishing the traffic in human beings in the District of Columbia, but the bill never came 
to a vote. He also made a speech offering what came to be known as the "Spot Resolutions," 
because they took President Polk to task for needlessly, as he thought, precipitating the war 
with Mexico. 

Before Lincoln returned home to stay he made a visit to New England, speaking in the inter- 
ests of Zachary Taylor. He had always been a great admirer of Henry Clay, but he saw that 
Clay could never be elected to the presidency, so he did all he could for that staunch Southern 
Whig, "Old Rough and Ready," as General Taylor was called. He also visited Niagara and 
began to write a lecture about the falls. 

About this time he perfected his invention for helping stranded steamboats over shallows in 
the variable Western rivers. His model, whittled out of a cigar box, is still one of the inter- 
esting sights in the Patent Office. 

The service for which he was best known in Congress was a humorous speech against General 
Cass, referring to his own bloodless heroism in the Black Hawk War, as follows: 

By the way, Mr. Speaker, did you know I am a military 
hero? Yes, sir; in the days of the Black Hawk War, I 
"fought, bled" and — came away ! Speaking of General Cass's 
career reminds me of my own. I was not at Stillman's 
defeat, but I was about as near it as Cass was to Hull's 
surrender; and, like him. I saw the place very soon after- 
wards. It is quite certain I did not break my sword for 
I had none to break ; but I bent my musket pretty badly 
on one occasion. If Cass broke his sword, the idea is he 
broke it in desperation. I bent my musket by accident. If 
General Cass went in advance of me in picking whortle- 
berries, I guess I surpassed him in charges upon the wild 
onions. If he saw any live, fighting Indians, it was more 
than I did ; but I had a good many bloody struggles with 
mosquitoes, and. although I never fainted from loss of 
blood, I can truly say I was often very hungry. Mr. Speaker, 
if I should ever conclude to doff whatever our Democratic 
friends may suppose there is of black-cockade federalism 
about me, and thereupon they shall take me up as their 
candidate for the presidency. I protest they shall not make 
fun of me. as they have of General Cass, by attempting to 
write me into a military hero .' 




^s& 



Hit model, whittled out of a cie'er box 



I9IO 



AUGUST 



1910 



SUN. 



MON. 

8 



TUES. 



WED. 



10 



THUR. 



II 



FRI. 



12 



SAT. 



13 



m^ 



THE LINCOLN 




STORY-CALENDAR 



THE DEATH OF LINCOLN'S FATHER 




EING elected to Congress did not seem to make Thomas Lincoln think any better 
of his son's abilities or attainments. While in Washington Abraham sent "Billy" 
Greene, his fellow-clerk at Offutt's, to call on his father who was still living in 
a hovel at Goose Nest Prairie in Coles County, Illinois. The old man was 
still critical of his son's course in life, and said: 

"I s'pose Abe's still a-foolin' hisself with eddication. I tried to stop it, but 
he's got that fool idee in his head, an' it can't be got out." 

Thomas Lincoln was taken with his last illness two years after Greene's 
visit. Abraham, unable then to go to see his father, wrote to the family: 

I sincerely hope Father may yet recover his health. Tell him to confide in our great and merciful Maker, 
who will not turn away from him in any e.xtremity. He notes the fall of the sparrow, and numbers the hairs 
of our heads, and He will not forget the dying man who puts his trust in Him. 

It deepens the pathos of this situation to remember that the son had to write this letter to his 
stepbrother, John Johnston, to have it read to his dying father, as the old man could not even 
read his own child's writing. Thomas died in 1851, at the age of 73, and, like Abraham's own 
mother, "never knew" his son's honor, with which he was to crown the name of their humble 
family. 

The father had hardly departed this life when the stepbrother, brought up with the same 
chance and surroundings that Abe had, showed his gain in good-for-nothingness, even as Abraham 
was growing in grandeur. The man was really lazy; he wanted to sell out and go to Missouri, dis- 
posing of the quarter-section of land Abe had bought with his 
first five-hundred-dollar lawyer's fee to provide for his good 
stepmother in her old age. Lincoln had to write the following 
letter to protect her from her own son: 

Dear Brother : Vour letter of the 22nd is just received. Your 
proposal about selling the east forty acres of land is all that I want or 
could claim for myself, but I am not satisfied with it on Mother's ac- 
count. I want her to have her living, and I feel that it is my duty, to 
some extent, to see that she is not wronged. She had a right of dower 
in the other two forties, but it seems she has already let you take that, 
hook and line. You propose to sell the rest for three hundred dollars, 
take one hundred away with you, and leave her two hundred at 8 per 
cent., making her the enormous sum of sixteen dollars a year I Now, 
if you are satisfied with treating her in that way, I am not. . . . 

Yours, etc., 

A. Lincoln. 

Not a word of boasting or of reproach because he bought 
and gave her the whole one hundred and sixty acres in the first 
place, for that would have hurt his stepmother's kind old 
heart! The house ID which Thoinu Lincoln died 




I9IO 



AUGUST 



1910 



SUN. 



MON. 



TUES. 



WED. 



THUR. 



FRI. 



14 15 16 17 18 19 



SAT. 



20 



% 



THE LINCOLN 




STORY-CALENDAR 



LINCOLN AND HIS NEIGHBORS 




ETURNING from his single term in Congress (he would not consider re-election 
because he believed in "giving the other boys a chance"), Lincoln thought his 
public career vyas ended for good and all. So he returned to his law practice 
with greater zeal than ever. Many characteristic stories are told of him in this 
period of his career. 

The Lincolns had three living sons, Robert, William and Thomas, whom 
his father nicknamed "Tadpole," which was afterward shortened to "Tad." 
Little Eddie, another son, had died in infancy. William died in the White 
House, in February, 1862, and "Tad" lived six years after his father's death, until 1871, when he 
was eighteen years old. Robert Todd Lincoln, the eldest son, now lives in Chicago, having served 
his country as Secretary of War under President Garfield and as Minister to England during Ben- 
jamin Harrison's administration. 

While at home it was a common thing to see indulgent Mr. Lincoln striding up the street with 
a boy on each shoulder and one clinging to the skirts of his long coat. One neighbor told of 
rushing to the street door of his own house to see what the matter was, for there was a loud out- 
cry. Looking out he saw Mr. Lincoln passing, followed by two of his boys, both of whom were 
crying loudly. 

"Why, Mr. Lincoln, what is the matter with them?" exclaimed the neighbor. 
"Just what's the matter with the whole world," laughed Mr. Lincoln. "I've 
got three walnuts and each wants two." 

A Springfield lady told of the following experience she had with their tall 
neighbor when she was a little girl in the following words (as related in Miss 
Tarbell's "Life of Lincoln."): 

My first strong impression of Mr. Lincoln was made by one of his kind deeds. I 
was going with a little friend for my first trip on the railroad cars. It was an epoch of 
my life. I had planned for it and dreamed of it for weeks. The day I was to go 
came, but as the hour of the train approached, the hackman. through some neglect. / -i^' 1 

failed to call for my trunk. As the minutes went on, I realized, in a panic of grief, that /^^/'fi' 
I should miss the train. I was standing by the gate, my hat and gloves on, sobbing as 
if my heart would break, when Mr. Lincoln came by. 

"Why, what's the matter?" he asked, and I poured out all my story. 

"How big's the trunk? There's still time, if it isn't too big," and he pushed 
through the gate and up to the door. My mother and I took him up to my room, where 
my little old-fashioned trunk stood, locked and tied. 

'*Oh, ho !" he cried ; "wipe your eyes and come on quick." And before I knew 
what he was going to do, he had shouldered the trunk, was down stairs, and striding 
out of the yard. Down the street he went, fast as his long legs could carry him ; I 
trotting behind, drying my tears as I went. We reached the station in time. Mr. Lincoln 
put me on the train, kissed me good-bye, and told me to have a good time. It was 
just like him. "It wu ju« like him" 




I9IO 



AUGUST 



1910 



SUN. 



MON. 



21 22 



TUES. 



WED. 



THUR. 



FRI. 



SAT. 



23 24 25 26 27 



%«•' 



THE LINCOLN 




STORY-CALENDAR 




STORIES OF LINCOLN WHILE "OUT ON 
THE CIRCUIT ' 

HILE Lincoln was always full of fun and appreciated wit or humor wherever 
he found it, he was no clown or court fool. He held the highest respect of the 
courts in which he practised, and won some great cases. Many are the stories 
UJma^^L»S[(ll *°''^ °^ ''™ while on the Eighth Judicial Circuit of Illinois. One was about 
)fHlV9l»\\f ^^^ meaning of the word "demonstrate." One winter he studied geometry far 
into the night for weeks, until he had mastered the first six books of Euclid 
before he was satisfied that he knew the real meaning of that word. 

One day he and a certain judge were talking about horse trades. The 
judge said he could beat Mr. Lincoln in swapping horses. It resulted in an 
agreement between the two lawyers to meet next morning at nine where they 
were to trade under forfeit of twenty-five dollars. Lincoln came to the place at the appointed time 
with a sawhorse on his shoulder. The judge and a group of spectators were already there with 
the sorriest, flee-bitten, spavined old crowbate ever seen in those parts. It was too much for 
Lincoln, who took one look at the blind, bony, corrugated creature, gave a gasp, and sat down on 
his sawhorse to exclaim: 

"Well, Judge, that's the worst I was ever beaten in a horse trade!" 

Many stories are told of his kindness of heart toward the humblest of creatures — how he 
hunted up a bird's nest to restore little fallen fledglings to the 
mother bird. The story of his rescuing a pig from the mire is told 
with several variations. The following is chosen because it illus- 
trates the unselfishness of Lincoln's Ufe, and because it refers also 
to his friend Edward D. Baker, to whose rescue Lincoln once came 
down through the ceiling: 

They were riding over a rough corduroy road, in an old "mud-wagon" 
coach, Lincoln and Baker were discussing the subject of "selfishness." Lin- 
coln maintained that people do good from selfish motives. Crossing a shaky 
bridge over a slough, they looked out and espied an old razorbaek sow on 
the bank of the big mudhole making a terrible noise because her pigs had got 
in and were in danger of drowning in the deep puddle. Lincoln called out : 

"Driver, can't you stop just a minute ?" 

"Yes," replied the driver, "if the other feller don't object." 

The "other feller" didn't object, so Mr. Lincoln jumped out, ran back to 
the slough, began to lift the little pigs out of the mud and water, ar»d place 
them on the bank. When he returned to the muddy stage. Colonel Baker 
remarked : 

"Now, Lincoln, will you tell me where does selfishness come in in this 
little episode?" 

"Why, bless your soul. Baker, that was the very essence of selfishness. 
I should have had no peace of mind all day if I had gone on and left that 
suffering old sow worrying over those pigs. I did it to get peace of mind, "The worrt I wai ever beoten in 
don't you see ?" a hone trade ! " 




I9IO 



SUN. 



AUGUST— SEPTEMBER 



MON. 



TUES. 



WED. 



THUR. 



FRI. 



I9IO 



SAT. 



28 29 30 31 



THE LINCOLN 




STORY-CALENDAR 



BACK IN THE POLITICAL ARENA 




UT the slavery question "would not down." The passage of the Kansas-Nebraska 
Bill virtually repealed the Missouri Compromise Act, and North and South 
struggled for the mastery in Kansas, through much bitterness and bloodshed. 
The South tried to make it a slave State and the North, aided by such aboli- 
tionists on the ground as John Brown, was determined that it should be a 
free State, and "Bleeding Kansas" was the result. 

As his former rival, Senator Stephen A. Douglas, of Illinois, called "The 
Little Giant," was responsible for the repeal of the Missouri Compromise, Lin- 
coln found it necessary to enter the political arena again to fight against slavery. "Judge" Douglas, 
as he was commonly called, speaking in central Illinois, said once that he would trust in Provi- 
dence for a certain slavery issue. Lincoln laughingly referred to the Judge's "trust" in a speech in 
reply, as follows: 

The Judge's trusting in Providence reminds me of the old woman who had been run away with by a 
fractious horse. She said she "trusted in Providence till the breechin' broke — then she didn't know what on 
airth to do I" 

And I guess that's the way it will be with the Judge, in this case. 

Then it was that Lincoln went up and down Illinois making his famous speeches against sla- 
very. In a masterly effort at Peoria, in 1854, he summed up the whole situation. Some of his 
expressions were seized upon and became the watchwords of antislavery: "Slavery is wrong and 
should be dealt with as wrong"; "A house divided against itself cannot stand — and this nation 
cannot exist half slave and half free — it must be all one or all the other." To-day these state- 
ments are self-evident truths, but when uttered they were advance signals of humanity. 

Then the Bloomington Convention, in 1856, met to organize the forces of antislavery. They 
worked along the lines laid down in other parts of the country for the new Republican party. 
But there was no fire, no harmony, no solidarity, until "Lincoln! Lincoln!" was called. Rising 
and coming to the front, he made a speech of such electric 
eloquence that it, like the "Lost Chord," "linked all perplexed 
meanings into one perfect peace." It was said to be "the 
greatest speech ever made in Illinois and puts Lincoln on 
the track for the presidency." 

This speech so entranced the reporters, as well as the 
audience, that the newspaper correspondents who came to 
make verbatim reports of it for the New York and Chicago 
papers forgot themselves, and no one made a note beyond the 
opening sentences. It came to be known as "Lincoln's Lost 
Speech." 




- ^,■■'*?.>s^•<^Mi!w4.^^'-^^*«i^ 



* Trusted in Providence till the breechin* 
broke ** 



I9IO 



SEPTEMBER 



1910 



SUN. 



MON. 



TUES. 



WED. 



THUR. 



8 



FRI. 



SAT. 



10 



m^ 



THE LINCOLN 




STORY-CALENDAR 



"BATTLES OF THE GIANTS 




N a few weeks after the "Lost Speech," while Lincoln was "out on the Circuit," 
at Urbana, Illinois, word was brought to him that he had just received one hun- 
dred and ten votes at the Republican Convention, assembled in Philadelphia, 
for the vice-presidential nomination. He looked incredulous and shrugged his 
shoulders, saying he did not think the votes were for him. "There's another 
great man named Lincoln down in Massachusetts. I guess he's the man," he 
explained. 

In 1858 Lincoln was nominated to represent Illinois in the Senate, in Douglas's 
place. He and Senator Douglas made the most memorable senatorial canvass 
in history. The question of slavery was discussed everywhere. Lincoln chal- 
lenged Douglas to join in a series of debates, and the "Little Giant" reluctantly accepted. Seven 
towns, in all sections of the State, were chosen, and the dates ranged from August to October. 
The average attendance at these debates was estimated at ten thousand. Debate day was a holi- 
day for each region. Thousands of people came scores of miles; many migrated from adjoining 
counties and States, and encamped round about the places where the debates were held. There 
were demonstrations in favor of each of the rival candidates, and all over Illinois there were pro- 
cessions, picnics, fairs, barbecues, floral parades, bands, and so on. 

Senator Douglas was a skilled and polished speaker, and he was among his friends. The rail- 
roads placed special cars and even trains at his disposal. He had everything to lose and Lincoln 
had everything to win. Douglas began with a domineering, if not in- 
sulting, demeanor toward his almost unknown antagonist. Lincoln's best 
friends thought his challenging Douglas was a grand blunder. But 
Lincoln was deeply, thoroughly, in earnest. He told but few stories. 
His voice rang, high and clear, to the outer edges of the great throngs, 
but Douglas soon became hoarse, speaking with great difficulty, some- 
times barking like a dog. 

Lincoln's sincerity, logic, quick-wittedness and good nature won the 
day. He often parried and turned back Douglas's savage blows upon 
himself like a boomerang. Douglas propounded a set of questions for 
Lincoln to answer. Lincoln answered these and asked Douglas several 
questions. Among them was one which forced Douglas to interpret the 
Dred Scott decision. Lincoln's friends said, "If you ask that you will 
lose the senatorship." Lincoln replied, "Yes; but the fight of i860 
will be worth a hundred of this." Douglas walked right into Lincoln's 
trap. He answered "the Freeport question" to suit his hearers in Illinois, 
but offended the South — for the whole country, through the newspapers, 
was now breathlessly watching the struggle. 

Douglas was elected to the Senate, though a greater popular vote 
was polled for Lincoln principles. 

Lincoln took his defeat gracefully. He did not pretend that he was 
not disappointed. He said he was "like the boy that stumped his toe — 
hurt too bad to laugh, and too big to cry." Lincola auwered theie 







I9IO 



SEPTEMBER 



1910 



SUN. 



II 



MON. 



12 



TUE^S. 



WED. 



THUR. 



FRI. 



SAT. 



13 14 15 16 17 



w 



i 



THE LINCOLN 




STORY-CALENDAR 



LINCOLN'S OWN LIFE-STORY 




FTER the Lincoln-Douglas debates Abraham Lincoln was known all over the 
country. Calls came for the wonderful speaker who had coped with Stephen 
A. Douglas to address mass meetings in Kansas, in Ohio, and in New England. 
Lincoln was invited to speak at Cooper Institute, New York City. That speech 
delighted the great political leaders and, with the photograph he had taken that 
day, convinced the country that he was not the wild Hoosier his enemies had 
painted him. Ever since the "Lost Speech" and his receiving the votes for the 
vice-presidential nomination, many Illinois men talked of him as a presidential 
possibility. But Lincoln himself scouted the idea as absurd. The idea of men- 
tioning him with Seward, Chase and other leaders! It was foolish. 
But after his trip to New York and New England he was convinced that it was his duty to 

aid the movement in his behalf in his own State. So he wrote out the following brief story of 

his life for a friend: 

J. W. Fell, Esq., Springfield, December 20, 1S59. 

My Dear Sir: 

Herewith is a little sketch, as you requested. There is not much of it, for the reason, I suppose, that 
there is not much of me. If anything be made of it, I wish it to be modest, and not to go beyond the 
material. ... 

I was born February 12, i8og, in Hardin County, Kentucky. My parents were both born in Virginia, 
of undistinguished families — second families, perhaps I should say. My mother, who died in my tenth year, 
was of a family of the name of Hanks. My paternal grandfather, Abraham Lincoln, emigrated to Kentucky 
about 1781 or 17S2, where, a year or two later, he was killed by the Indians, not in battle, but by stealth, 
when he was laboring to open a farm in the forest. His ancestors, who were Quakers, went to Virginia from 
Berks County. Pennsylvania. . . . 

My father, at the death of his father, was but six years of age, and grew up 
literally without education. He removed from Kentucky to what is now Spencer 
County, Indiana, in my eighth year. . . . There I grew up. There were some 
schools so called but no qualification was ever required of a teacher beyond "readin'. 
writin' and cipherin' " to the rule of three. ... I have not been to school since. 
The little advance I now have upon this store of education I have picked up from 
time to time under the pressure of necessity. . . . 

I was raised to farm work, which I continued till I was twenty-two. At twenty- 
one I came to Illinois, Macon County. Then I got to New Salem, where I re- 
mained a year as a sort of clerk, in a store. Then came the Black Hawk War ; and 
I was elected a captain of volunteers, which gave me more pleasure than any I 
have had since. I . . . ran for the Legislature the same year (1832) and was 
beaten — the only time I was ever beaten by the people. The next and three suc- 
ceeding biennial elections I was elected to the Legislature. I was not a candidate 
afterward. During this legislative period I had studied law, and removed to Spring- 
field to practise it. In 1846 I was elected to the lower House of Congress. Was not 
a candidate for re-election. From 1849 to 1854. both inclusive, practised law more 
assiduously than ever before. ... I was losing interest in politics when the repeal 
of the Missouri Compromise aroused me again. What I have done since is pretty 
well known. 

If any personal description is thought desirable, it may be said I am, in height, 
six feet four inches, nearly ; lean in flesh, weighing on an average, one hundred and 
eighty pounds, dark complexion, with coarse black hair and gray eyes. "No other 
marks and brands recollected." 

Yours truly, 

A. Lincoln. The Cooper Institute porUait 




I9IO 



SEPTEMBER 



1910 



SUN. 



MON. 



1$ 19 



TUES. 



20 



WED. 



THUR. 



FRI. 



SAT. 



21 22 23 24 



THE LINCOLN 




STORY-CALENDAR 




THE "RAIL-SPUTTER" CAMPAIGN 

T was at the Republican State convention, held at Decatur. Illinois, that John 
Hanks marched in with two rails he and Abe Lincoln had split thirty years 
before, that electrified the convention and stampeded it for the "Rail-splitter" 
candidate. The men of Illinois carried their "passionate enthusiasm" to the 
Republican National Convention, a week later, in the specially built Wigwam, 
at Chicago, in the middle of May, i860. 

This convention nominated Abraham Lincoln and gave over to frenzied 
demonstrations of joy, which caught like wild-fire. As Douglas said, there 
wasn't "a tar-barrel left in the whole State" The Rail-splitter campaign was 
one of thrilling enthusiasm. The "Wide Awakes" of '60 were organized. 
A committee notified the candidate in his plain home in Springfield. Friends offered to supply 
liquors for refreshment on that occasion, but Lincoln said: 

"No, we have never had such things in our home and I am not going to begin now." 
A native of England, a Springfield neighbor of Lincoln, was astonished when he heard of the 
nomination, and exclaimed: 

"What! Abe Lincoln nominated for President of the United States? A man that buys a ten- 
cent beefsteak for breakfast, and carries it home himself! Can it be possible?" 

The opposition made no end of fun of such a candidate — "a nullity," "a third-rate country 
lawyer" who had succeeded only as a "rail-splitter" aivd in getting himself called "Honest Abe," but 
had been defeated for the Senate. They sneered at his 
"coarse, clumsy jokes," and said he did not know how to 
wear clothes, and often sat in his shirt sleeves. He was of 
no family, did not know Latin and Greek, and had never 
traveled. Manufacturers all over the country made him 
presents of hats and other articles of apparel. Mr. Lincoln 
laughed at these gifts and, one day, exclaimed: 

"Well, wife, if nothing else comes out of this scrape, 
we are going to have some clothes, aren't we?" 

He used to laugh over the apology of a newsboy who 
was selling his photograph — one taken with tousled hair, 
which was his best-known portrait at that time. Lincoln 
liked to imitate the boy's shrill, nasal treble: "Here's your 
old Abe! He'll look better when we gets his hair combed!" 
Lincoln's chief concern seemed to be lest his home 
town should go against him, and was deeply grieved be- 
cause so many Springfield ministers were using their in- 
fluence in favor of his opponents and slavery! He said: ' 

"These men will find they have not read their Bibles 
aright." y 

Election day fell on the 6th of November. Lincoln 
voted the ticket with the "President" cut off. He spent the 
evening in the telegraph office. He seemed gratified when 
he heard New York had gone for him — but expressed keener 
satisfaction over the vote of his own precinct. About mid- 
night he went home and, finding his wife asleep, roused 

her with: "He'll look better when he gets hii hiir 

"Mary! Mary! Mary! mje're elected!" combed!" 




1910 SEPTEMBER— OCTOBER 19 lO 



SUN. 



MON. 



TUES. 



WED. 



THUR. 



FRI. 



SAT. 



25 26 27 2S 29 30 I 



THE LINCO'LN 



STORY-CALENDAR 





PRESIDENT-ELECT LINCOLN 

(A NEW LINCOLN STORY) 

ILLIAM H. HERNDON, Lincoln's partner and biographer, relates that, as Lin- 
coln was leaving their office for the last time, his eye caught their little old 
rusty sign, LINCOLN & HERNDON, he said, with emotion: 

Let it hane there Billy. Give our clients to understand that the election of a Presi- 
dent makes no difference in the firm. ... If I live, I'm coming back some time, and then 
we'll go right on practising law as if nothing had ever happened. 

Lincoln had "found" Billy Herndon, a boy in his friend Speed's store. As 
soon as Mr. Lincoln was alone in business he took Billy into his office, to keep 
it when he was away, especially while "out on the circuit." Though the young man s earning 
cao^citv never amounted to much, he soon made Billy an equal partner religioiisly dividing wi h 
hta every fee and collection, even when Billy had "nothing to do with the case.'' When Lincoln 
had lued the Rock-Island railroad and collected his largest fee, of $5,000, Herndon told that he 
handed over-Mly's half" as coolly as if he were giving him a few cents to buy a newspaper. 

Herndon made great use of all these chances for intimate knowledge in writing The Life of 

Lincoln "whic"con?arns certain misstatements concerning his great partner. Besides "making 

Herndon Tnd leaving him with the prestige of being "the President's partner." Lincoln showed him 

?r;H-r\inHn^f^es The writer was told of one of these by another guest at the Lincoln 

Cerenraf^el'ebrS^at Iprinlfiefd, lUinois, last February. This story, in brief, was as follows: 

Mr Lincoln had collected a hopeless and difficult _ account of one thousand doUors for a Springfield merchant 

-"^ :^^^:^,:'ttltLri^ot!"t^Z^^^^^^^ need it Then I'll come and get the 'big slice.' " 

The Clin seefngtC' Mr Lincoln -was in a great hurry, did not insist on h.s 

lie Client, ="="='"«"'"'•, ^-Hcrpd the hookkeeoer to hand him one hundred 

accepting proper P^Xit^nd strode right across toAe Court House, still clutching 

fhfbnis "-"He used""' all ^o sive three'young scapegraces, who had been on a spree 

'"^ ■8fe'o''f'^\°he'ras°cals^raf ^B°i,r'ie^rnd^r'^finc'^o°n%a"d'\ftt:tried to get Bill to 
,ton drinkUe and had often helped him out of these scrapes. The poor fellow went 
from bad J!f' worse He hung around Springfield, after Lincoln's death, for years. 

^ '^'"^hl'l^T'un^r^beca-l'greirde'nt -^irasred for a fat office but. of course 
Lincoln could not do for him what he had done as a private citizen H^ndon 

failed to Appear It his own wedding, and innuendoes against Mrs. Lincoln Thai^ 
was Bill Herndon's revenge. Of course, he said much '" pra.se of Lincoln. He 
"'^^ ^^lY^'Jt.^^ tTeTnlrV^udrfnf da^atle treachery lurking 
beneath his pretended praise, I declare .1 can't help being reminded of that other 
Judas who betrayed his Master with a kiss. 




I9IO 

SUN. 

2 



MON. 

3 



OCTOBER 

TUES. WED. THUR- 



FRI. 

7 



1910 

SAT. 

8 



THE LINCOLN 




STORY-CALENDAR 




AT THE HELM OF STATE 

A FAMILIAR STORY CORRECTED 

MMEDIATELY after Lincoln's election, seven Southern States had called a convention 
and issued orders of secession, South Carolina leading, to the extent of publishing news 
from other States of the Union under the heading, "Foreign Intelligence." I he first 
capital of the Confederate States of America was Montgomery, Alabama, and Jefferson 
Davis was elected their President. Members of Buchanan's Cabinet were doing all in 
their power to aid the South and destroy the National Government. President Lmcoln 
looked on in helpless alarm. Observing Buchanan's weak and foolish admissions and in- 
action he said to a friend, "Buchanan is giving the case away and I can't help it.' 

Almost the last thing he did was to take the journey across the country, fording 
swollen rivers, to visit his father's grave and say good-by to his dear old stepmother, 
who survived him. On February nth, 1861, the day before his fifty-second birthday, he 
bade farewell to Springfield, making the following speech at the station ; 

"My Frifnds: No one not in my position can appreciate the sadness I feel at this parting. To this people 
I owe all that I am. Here I have lived more than a quarter of a century : here my children were horn, and 
here one of them lies buried. I know not how soon I shall see you again. A duty devolves upon me which 
is perhaps, greater than that which has devolved upon any other man since the days of Washington, He 
would never have succeeded except for the aid of Divine Providence, upon which he at all times rel-ed. I 
feel that I cannot succeed without the same Divine aid which sustained him, and in the same Almighty Being 
place my reliance for support : and I hope you, my friends, will pray that I. may receive thf'D.v.ne assist- 
ance, without which I cannot succeed, but with which success is certain. Again, I bid you all an affectionate 
farewell." 

He made many speeches on his winding way to Washington. Perhaps the most important of these was 
that in Tatsing a flag over Independence Hall. Philadelphia, when he said he "would rather be assassinated 
on thi^ spot'" than surrender the principle of union and liberty for which the fathers had given their lives 

Beinr nformed by two groups of friends, independently of each other, that there was a we 1-laid plot to 
murder him whTle passing through Baltimore, he left Harrisburg and went through Baltimore in the night, 
arriving in Washington, to the surprise of the country, on the morning of the 23d of February. 

The story so often told of the President-elect losing his valise containing his inaugural 
address, is wrong in several particulars. Robert, Lincoln s eldest son, did really mislay the 
bag, but it happened in Indianapolis, not in Harrisburg. and Mr. Lincoln did not put it in 
his pocket and carry it the rest of the way himself, as is always Published, but as soon as 
the "grip sack " as he called it, was found, he turned to Robert, handed it back to him 
and said gently, "Now, Bob, see if you can't take better care of it. 

It was in keeping with the character of Abraham Lincoln to give his son another 
chance; and Robert faithfully guarded his precious charge the rest of the way. 

The week before his inauguration the President-elect spent in conferring with members 
of his prospective Cabinet. Mr. Seward, after accepting the portfolio of Secretary of State, 
tried to withdraw, but Mr. Lincoln urged him to retain '•■...,, ., , „„„„ 

When President Buchanan escorted Mr. Lincoln to the Capitol to take the oath of office, 
the old President was bowed nearly double with age. This made Lincoln seem a giant in 
stature beside him. He was introduced by his old friend Baker, to w^iose aid he had come 
down through the ceiling many years before, and who was now Senator f"^™ 0_^^Som 
Lincoln's "ancient enemy," Stephen A. Douglas, held his hat while he was delivering his 
inaugural which was oflfered to the South as an olive branch and was received like a 
firebrand. It closed with the following conciliatory message : 

"I am loath to close. We are not enemies but friends. We niust not be enemies. 
Though passion may have strained, it must not break our bonds of affection. 1 he mystic 
chordfoT memory .Stretching from every battlefield and patriot grave to every living 
heart and hearthstone all over this broad land, will yet swell the chorus of the Union 
when again touched, as surely they will be, by the better angels of our nature. 




Deliverin£ the loaugural 



I9IO 



OCTOBER 



1910 



SUN. 



MON. 



10 



TUBS. 

II 



WED. 



12 



THUR. 



FRl. 



SAT. 



13 14 15 



w 



THE LINCOLN 




3 



STORY-CALENDAR 



"THE WAR HAS ACTUALLY BEGUN" 




EFORE Lincoln's Cabinet had begun to understand that he was greater than any 
of them. Fort Sumter was fired on and its brave little garrison was forced to 
surrender, April 14th, 1861. This act roused the North to action. When the 
President called for seventy-five thousand men the response was prompt. Five 
days later, April 19th, the Sixth Regiment was mobbed and the first blood of 
the Civil War was shed in the streets of Baltimore. Leading men came from 
Baltimore to protest against troops crossing Maryland soil on their way to the 
national Capital. President Lincoln replied with one of his first characteristic 
speeches as President: 

"We must have troops; and as they can neither crawl under Maryland, nor 
fly over it, they must come across it." , a j r 

Washington was in danger of attack any day and rumors were nfe. Many people tied trom 
the city and Mrs. Lincoln was urged to seek safety with her three boys. She stoutly replied: 
"I am as safe as Mr. Lincoln, and I shall not leave him." 

The first battles were defeats for the North. The battle of Bull Run, so near the Capital, was 
a crushing blow and a great discouragement. President Lincoln had to call again and again for 

Two Confederate commissioners, Mason and Slidell, were on their way to England on the English 
steamship "Trent " when Captain Wilkes captured them. The country was delirious with joy over 
this bold stroke, and members of the President's Cabinet even opposed returning the commissioners. 
But Lincoln saw that a vital principle was involved, for which the United States had gone into 
the War of 181 2 with England. Lowell explained the case when he made his Hosea Biglow say: 

"We give the critters back, John, 

'Cause Abra'm thought 'twas right; 
It warn't your bullyin' clack, John, 
Provokin' us to fight." 

While his Cabinet members were insulting him by patronizing him. 
the newspapers, even of his owm party, including the "New York 
Tribune" were ridiculing him. Wendell Phillips and other abolitionists 
were sneering at him, and battle after battle was going against him. 
The South was calling him an ogre, a mulatto and a fiend incarnate. 
President Lincoln's faith and patience were put to a painful test. 
Besides, he had to dispose of his Secretary of War Simon Cameron, 
for conduct which was certainly open to question. He believed Kdwin 
M. Stanton was the best man for the responsible place, though Stanton 
had always grossly abused him. The other members of the Cabinet de- 
murred for Stanton was a very opinionated, disagreeable man but the 
President, in the grandeur of his character, forgave and forgot Stanton s 
insults and allowed for his peculiar temperament as in the following story: 

"We may have to treat Stanton," the President went on, ' as they are 
sometimes obliged to treat a minister I know out West. He gets wrought 
up to so high a pitch of excitement in his prayers and exhortations that 
they have to put bricks into his pockets to keep him down. We may have 
to serve Stanton the same way, but I guess we'll let him jump awhile first. 




Mrs. Mnrj- Todd Lincoln 



I9IO 



OCTOBER 



1910 



SUN. 



MON. 



tue:s. 



WED. 



THUR. 



FRI. 



16 17 18 19 20 21 



SAT. 



22 



THE LINCOLN 




STORY-CALENDAR 



MANY SORROWS IN THE WHITE HOUSE 




S far as possible to a President in time of war, Lincoln lived the simple life in 
the White House which was, for four years, a kind of grand army headquarters. 
Many are the stories told of mothers, wives, sisters and sweethearts who found 
easy access to the President, and left his benignant and sympathetic presence, 
smiling through their tears, clutching precious little papers that were to give 
life or liberty to their loved ones. If men deserted, it was their "cowardly 
legs" that "ran away with them." Lincoln called his collection of desertions 
his "leg cases." All this seemed like trifling to the official martinets who had 
to preserve discipline in the army. One old man, begging the life of his son 
who was really a "bummer," and deserved shooting, if ever a deserter should 
have been shot, received from the President this telegram: "Job Smith is not to be shot until 
further orders from me." The old man was disappointed. The penalty seemed to be only post- 
poned. Lincoln laid his hand tenderly on the aged father's trembling shoulder and said: "Well, 
my old friend, I see you are not very well acquainted with me; if your son never looks on death 
till further orders come from me to shoot him he will live to be a great deal older than 
Methuselah." . , , r 

Nothing seemed to please President Lincoln more than a joke at the expense ot some P?"*- 
pous officer's dignity or vanity, unless, perhaps, a good story of the grim humor of the soldiers 
in the midst of danger and death. A congressman, one day, took it upon himself to ask the Presi- 
dent how he could joke and be "reminded of a story" in the midst of so many cares, anxieties and 
sorrows. Lincoln replied, in deep fervor: t u- 

"You cannot be more anxious than I am; but I tell you now that if it were not for this vent 

At this very time disaster was following on the heels of disaster. The President's secretaries 
told, afterwards, of the ashy pallor that overspread his kind face when the news of Bull Run, Fred- 
ericksburg, and Chancellorsville came over the wire, and how he wrung his hands in despair, cry- 
ing out, at different times, from his almost broken heart: "What will the Country say! 
will the Country say!" "Will this terrible war never end?" "I can't bear 
any more and live!" "If there's a man out of hell that suffers more than 
I do, I pity him!" . , . , ,. 

In his own home a great grief came upon him. Willie, his darling 
companion, about twelve years old, was ill and taken alarmingly worse 
during a grand White House reception which the doctor had advised Mrs. 
Lincoln to go on and give, saying the boy's condition was not even critical. 
Willie died two or three days afterward, in February, 1862. In addition to 
national disasters, sneering editors and orators, and this private sorrow, 
the President feared that his bright little wife would lose her reason. Her 
girlish ambition to be mistress of the White House had been fulfilled as 
not one woman in a million has her child-dreams come true, but Mrs. 
Lincoln's devoted soul was "pierced through with many sorrows." A faith- 
ful nurse thus describes the father's emotion at the time of Willies death: 

Mr Lincoln came in. I never saw a man so bowed down with grief. . . . Great 
sobs choked him. He bowed his head in his hands, and his tall frame was convulsed 
with emotion. I stood at the foot of the bed, my eyes full of tears looking .-.t the 
man in silent, awestricken wonder. His grief unnerved him and made him a weak, 
passive child. I did not dream that his rugged nature could be so moved ; 1 sh.ill 
never forget those solemn moments. 



O, what 




Willie Lincoln 



I9IO 

SUN. 

23 



MON. 
24 



OCTOBER 

TUES. WED. THUR. 

25 26 27 



FRI. 
28 



I9IO 

SAT. 

29 



1^ 



m 



THE LINCOLN 




STORY-CALENDAR 



"WE'VE GOT TO SAVE THE UNION" 




HAT night I footed it up to the Soldiers' Home, where Mr. Lincoln was livin' 
then, right among the sick soldiers in their tents. There was lots of people 
settin' around in a little room, waitin' fer him. There wan't anybody there I 
knowed and I was feelin' a little funny when a door opened and out come little 
John Nicolay. Well, John didn't seem over glad to see me. 'Have you an ap- 
pointment with Mr. Lincoln?' he says. 'No, sir,' I says; 'I ain't, and it ain't 
necessary. . . . Tell him Billy Brown's here and see what he says.' In about two 
minutes the door popped open and out come Mr. Lincoln, his face all lit up. 
He saw me first thing, and he laid hold of me, and just shook my hands fit to kill. 'Billy,' he says, 
'now I am glad to see you. Come right in. You're goin" to stay to supper with Mary an' me.' He 
had a right smart of people to see, but as soon as he got through we went out on the back stoop 
and set down and talked and talked. He asked me about pretty nigh everybody in Springfield. I 
just let loose and told him about the weddin's and births and the funerals, and the buildin', and 
I guess there wan't a yarn I'd heard in the three years and a half he had been away that I didn't 
spin fer him. Laugh— you ought to ha' heard him laugh— just did my heart good, fer I could see 
what they'd been doin' to him. Always a thin man, but Lordy, he was thinner'n ever now, and his face 
was kind o' drawn and gray— enough to make you cry. Well, we had supper and then talked some 
more, and about ten o'clock I started down town. Wanted me to stay all night, but I said, 'Nope 
Mr. Lincoln, can't; goin' back to Springfield to-morrow.' 'Billy,' he says, 'what did you come 
down here for?' 'I come to see you, Mr. Lincoln.' 'But you ain't asked me 
for anything, Billy. What is it? Out with it. Want a post office?' 'No, 
Mr. Lincoln, just wanted to see you— felt kind o' lonesome— been so long 
since I'd seen you.' Well, sir, you ought to seen his face as he looked at me. 
'Billy Brown,' he says, slow-like, 'do you mean to tell me you come all the 
way from Springfield, Illinois, just to have a visit with me?' 'Yes, sir,' says 
I, 'that's about it, and I'll be durned if I wouldn't go to Europe to see you, 
if I couldn't do it no other way, Mr. Lincoln.' Well, sir, I never was so aston- 
ished in my life. He just grabbed my hand and shook it nearly off, and the 
tears just poured down his face, and he says: 'Billy, you never'll know what 
good you've done me. I'm homesick, Billy, just plumb homesick, and it 
seems as if this war would never be over. Many a night I can see the boys 
a-dyin' on the fields and can hear their mothers cryin' for 'em at home, and 
I can't help 'em, Billy. I have to send them down there. We've got to save 

the Union, Billy, we've got to.' " .. ^„ „, j^^ ^j ,jked 

From "He Knew Lincoln," by Ida M. Tarbell. and talked" 




I9IO 



OCTOBER— NOVEMBER 



1910 



SUN. 



MON. 



TUES. 



WED. 



THUR. 



FRI. 



30 31 



SAT. 



w^ 



THE LINCOLN 




STORY-CALENDAR 



THE QUAKER AND THE DRAFT 




HEN the draft was made my name was one that was drawn along with those 
of several other young Friends (Quakers), two others in our little meeting. 
It created a good deal of excitement among us. The two others paid their 
three hundred dollars each, but I felt it right to do nothing, feeling that I could 
not go myself nor give money to hire others to go. The proper military 
officer came out and notified me that I would be expected to report in the mili- 
tary camp at Lafayette, Indiana, for training, on a certain day. I told him that 
I could not conscientiously be there, that as I could not fight it would not do 
any good for me to report. Then he demanded the three hundred dollars. To this I replied: 
"If I believed that war is right I would prefer to go myself than to hire some one else to be 

shot in my place." 

He told me I would either have to come or pay the three hundred dollars, or he would be 
forced to sell my property. As I was firm in my decision ... he went out and looked over the 
farm, selected the stock that he proposed to sell and then sat down and commenced writing bills 
for the public sale of our horses, cattle and hogs. While he was writing, dinner was ready, and 
when we sat down to the table we insisted on his eating with us. We tried to keep up a pleasant 
conversation on various subjects, making no reference to the work he was engaged in. After 
dinner he turned to me and said: 

"If you would get mad and order me out of the house, I could do 
this work much easier, but here you are, feeding me and my horse while 
I am arranging to take your property from you. I tell you it's hard work." 

We told him we had no unkind feelings toward him as we sup- 
posed he was only obeying the orders of those who were superior to 
him. I went out again to my work and, when he had prepared the sale 
bills, he placed one on a large tree by the roadside in front of the house, 
and then rode around and placed the others in different places in the 
neighborhood. 

A few days before the time had arrived for the sale I was at Lafa- 
yette. The officer came to me and said: 

"The sale is postponed. I don't know when it will be. You can go 
on using your horses." 

I heard nothing more about it for several years. After the War 
closed I learned that Governor Morton, who was in Washington about 
that time, spoke to President Lincoln about it, and he ordered the sale 
to be stopped. 

From the Autobiography of Allen Jay, by permission of The John C. m>uton Company, publishers, also. 

of Wayne Whipple's "Story-Life of IJttcoln." 



^'^^^^^A 




I9IO 



NOVEMBER 



1910 



SUN. 



MON. 



TUES. 



8 



WED. 



THUR. 



10 



FRI. 



II 



SAT. 



12 



m 



THE LINCOLN 




STORY-CALENDAR 




LINCOLN AND HIS GENERALS 

RESIDENT LINCOLN spent nearly three years of the war searching for a gen- 
eral who was better able to manage the military campaigns than himself. After 
the first battle of Bull Run he appointed McClellan to the chief command. Mc- 
Clellan was a great military engineer and tactician, but was wanting in aggres- 
siveness. Lincoln treated this general with the utmost patience and even long- 
sufTering, for McClellan began to look upon himself as the savior of the country, 
and the President and his Cabinet as "geese" — one of his names for them! Mc- 
Clellan never appreciated the true greatness of Abraham Lincoln, nor, of course, 
what a pigmy he was himself, in comparison with the chief he took upon himself 
to slight and snub. Lincoln treated McCIellan's insults with large-minded 
charity, saying: "I will hold McCIellan's horse if he will win us a battle." 

In spite of the clamor on the part of the country the President patiently waited for McClellan 
to do something, then reluctantly removed him and appointed General Burnside, who did but little 
if any better. Then Halleck, Hooker and Meade failed. Battle after battle was lost until the war 
reached its "high water mark" at Gettysburg. To the great grief of the President, Lee was allowed 
to escape back into Virginia. During the bickering and temporizing of the generals in the East, 
Grant was winning victories in the West. He had earned the name, associating his initials with 
one of his ultimatums, of "Unconditional Surrender" Grant. While Gettysburg, so well planned and 
heroically fought, became only a drawn battle. Grant was winning an unmistakable victory at 
Vicksburg and received the surrender of Pemberton's army. 

In March, 1864, Grant was made commander of the armies, and the brilliant deeds of Sher- 
man and Sheridan were added to the bright pages of the history of the war. At last, the North 
had generals able to cope with such brave and chivalrous leaders as Generals Robert E. Lee and 
"Stonewall" Jackson. 

There were petty jealousies, and self-appointed commissions called upon the President in vain 
attempts to secure the removal of General Grant. One band of malcontents complained that Grant 
drank whisky. "Find out what brand," retorted Lincoln, "and I'll send a barrel of it to each of 
my other generals." "No," said the President, "I can't spare Grant. He fights." Lincoln had sub- 
lime confidence in Grant. He said he could sleep nights after Grant took command; if anything 
should or could be done. Grant would do it, he said. 

When the presidential campaign of 1864 came round. President 
Lincoln was naturally anxious to "finish this big job." McClellan was 
nominated by the Democrats to run against him. Stanton — loyal, 
trusty, ugly, disagreeable Stanton — discharged an officer for appearing 
at a McClellan mass meeting. Lincoln reinstated the man, saying he 
had a perfect right to vote against himself if he so wished. He said, 
"I'm the longest, but McCIellan's better looking." 

There was great thanksgiving throughout the North after Lin- 
coln's almost unanimous election, and throughout that winter the 
war was manifestly drawing to a close. The second Inaugural was 
of a very different tenor from the first. The burden of the first was 
to appease the South, and, if possible, avert a war. The second was j.|j 
to reconcile the North and arrange for a charitable and peaceable ijjl! 
adjustment of many difficulties brought about by the war. The second 
Inaugural closed with the following noble sentiments: 

With malice toward none ; with charity for all ; with firmness in the right, 
as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in, 
to bind up the nation's wounds ; to care for him who shall have borne the 
battle, .and for his widow and his orphan — to do all which may achieve and 
cherish a just and lasting peace among ourselves, and with all nations. Gen. U. S. Cr&nt 




I9IO 



NOVEMBER 



1910 



SUN. 



MON. 



TUES. 



WED. 



THUR. 



FRI. 



SAT. 



13 14 15 16 17 IS 19 



THE LINCOLN 




STORY-CALENDAR 




A NEW STORY OF 
LINCOLN'S GETTYSBURG ADDRESS 

YDIA," said good old Jacob of Ephrata, "let's go over to Gettysburg and hear 
Mr. Everett at the dedication of the battle-ground for a cemetery, day after 
to-morrow. We'll go to-morrow so as to be there bright and early the next 
day, in time to get a good place to see and hear all that's going on." 

It was a long drive from Ephrata to Gettysburg, but to hear Edward 
Everett's oration would be the privilege of a lifetime. Early in the morning 
of the 19th of November, 1863, Jacob and Lydia took their places near the front 
of the special platform erected on the great battle-field. 

There was a long, wearying delay. The sun shone unusually warm for 
November. At last the little procession arrived. President Lincoln was there 
with an escort from Washington, for he had been invited, as a matter of form, to make a few per- 
functory remarks at the close of the exercises. Edward Everett, for whose convenience the date 
had been postponed about a month, did not arrive on the field until after the hour set for him to 
begin his address. There were diplomats and other dignitaries. Jacob pointed out Secretary 
Seward, who, he thought, should have been made President instead of Mr. Lincoln. 

Lydia felt as if she could not stand there much longer, though the crowd was so dense she 
could not fall. Everything began to turn black, and she grew dizzy and weak; she felt herself 
going — sinking! There was confusion, crowding, and a man called out: 
"A woman has fainted!" 

In all their official foresight no provision had been made for a faintmg woman. The crowd 
pressed tighter. She heard a voice out of the vague spaces above the chaos around her, 
commanding: 

"Here, hand that woman to me." .,,.,. 1 » 

Lydia felt strong yet gentle hands lifting her, it seemed, out of all her troubles— then she lost 

herself. ^ ^ ^ 

When she came to herself again she was sitting on that high platform 
chair with thousands of eyes upon her, and who should be sitting by, 
fanning her tenderly, but the President of the United States! All this 
was more than modest Lydia could bear. She gasped, hoarsely: 

"I— feel— better now. I want — to go — back." 

"O, no, madam," said Mr. Lincoln cheerily, "you stay right where ^ ^ 
you are. It was hard enough to pull you out of there, and we couldn't 'V^i'^^ 
stick you back into that crowd again." ' '^*^^ 

So this is why, in some old pictures of Abraham Lincoln dehvermg 
his immortal address at Gettysburg, a little, shrinking old lady in plain 
garb — not Lucretia Mott, but humble Lydia of Ephrata — is shown sit- 
ting near him. During that long two hours, while Everett was deliver- 
ing his brilliant and scholarly oration, poor Lydia could not forget her 
embarrassing position. But she forgot herself and everythmg save 
the speaker and his wonderful words when her gallant attendant began 
his brief address. 

On their way home next day, Jacob, after a long silence, remarked: 

"Mr. Everett's oration was grand, wasn't it? But, do you know, 
Lydia. that little speech of 'Father Abraham's' was the best of all; yes, 
I think it was the best fee ever heard." ,-, , , c 

Written from the account given by Lydia herself to Dr. Josefh i. 
Walton, George School, Pennsylvania. 



in Mr 



. Li 



* * 

ncoln's easy 




I9IO 

SUN. 

20 



MON. 

21 



NOVEMBER 

TUES. WED. THUR. FRI. 

22 23 24 25 



1910 

SAT. 

26 



THE LINCOLN 




STORYXALCNDAR 



LINCOLN, STANTON, AND THE "BOYS 

IN BLUE" 




T seems strange now that Stanton, of all men, was among the very first to appre- 
ciate the simple grandeur of the Gettysburg Address — Stanton, rude, sneering, 
caustic, contemptuous, obstinate Stanton — who took pleasure in insulting Lin- 
coln when they first met, eight years earlier, in the great McCormick reaper 
case; Stanton, who had always called Lincoln a gorilla, an imbecile and a fool 
— with many profane expletives! Mind could never have conquered the ob- 
durate soul of Secretary Stanton. It was Lincoln's heart alone that wrought this 
greatest miracle of his life. In spite of Stanton's atrocious treatment of him. 
President Lincoln recognized the sterling worth and patriotism of his snarling 
enemy, and said that he was glad to bear Stanton's wrath for the good he could 
do the nation. People, at home and abroad, freely criticised the President for allowing his Secre- 
tary of War to oppose and stultify him in so many trivial ways. But, little by little, as a trainer 
breaks in a fractious horse, Lincoln tightened the curb, until one day, in utter kindness, yet with 
adamantine firmness, the President came to say, "Mr. Secretary, it will ha've to be done." And it 
was done. 

After that last Cabinet meeting on the fatal fourteenth of April (Good Friday), 1865, Stanton 
remarked, in his devoted pride, to the Attorney-General, "Didn't our chief look grand to-day!" . . . 
Lincoln appreciated the Southern leaders, and had all charity and tenderness for the South. Once, 
seeing a photograph of General Robert E. Lee, he looked at it long and tenderly, saying, "It is the 
face of a noble, noble, brave man." At another time he was heard to say of General "Stonewall" 
Jackson, before his own discovery of Grant: 

"He is a brave, Presbyterian soldier. If we, in the North, had ';^ 

such generals, this war would not drag along so." 



A large part of the patriotism of the soldiers was their love for 
Abraham Lincoln. He seemed to be the personification of their 
country, threatened and wronged. He meant more to the people than 
"Uncle Sam"— /le was "Father Abraham!" When President Lincoln 
reluctantly issued call after call for soldiers, and more and more sol- 
diers, the people seemed never to tire of responding: 

"We are coming. Father Abraham, 
Three hundred thousand more." 

The soldiers said among themselves: "He cares for us! he loves 
us!" and they cheerfully, gladly, even humorously — to be like him— 
marched into the jaws of death for his dear sake. It was far different i\^ 
from the love Napoleon inspired in his troopers, for their loyalty flagged |V 
and finally failed. It was Napoleon's selfish heartlessness that made 
him a colossal failure. It was Lincoln's self-giving heart which 
crowned his life with immortal success. From early boyhood he had 
lived his life, a burning and shining illustration of his own words: 




"With malice toward none; with charity for all.' 



Secretary Stanton 



I9IO 



NOVEMBER— DECEMBER 



1910 



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27 28 29 30 



THUR. 



I 



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THE LINCOLN 




STORY-CALENDAR 



LINCOLN AND LITTLE TAD 




R. LINCOLN seldom spoke of Willie. Robert was away at Harvard College, 
and later at the front, as one of General Grant's aides. Thus the President's 
wealth of love was lavished on Tad, "the pet of the nation." The boy was 
passionately affectionate — his father's inseparable companion. A word from Mr. 
Lincoln would make him laugh gleefully or melt him to tears. In the solemn 
Cabinet meetings he played about, sometimes falling asleep on the floor or in 
his father's lap. He accompanied the President to Fortress Monroe, and clung 
to his father's hand when Lincoln strode through the streets of Richmond. 
While the President was making his last speech, from the northern portico of 
the White House, little Tad stood by, catching the leaves of his father's manu- 
script as they floated down to him. When they came too slowly to suit the boy, he demanded, in 
a piping voice: 

"Papa-day, give me another paper." (Tad's pet name for his father was "Papa-day.' ) The 
little fellow had a nasal impediment which affected his speech so that strangers could not well 
understand him. But the father understood his afflicted boy — yes, every word! No matter who 
was in conference with the President, nor what grave matters might be under discussion, whether 
with Seward, Stanton or Sumner— if little Tad spoke, his father's face bent tenderly over him. 
Senators and secretaries were often annoyed by Tad's interruptions. All these things combined 
to intensify Lincoln's yearning devotion to little Tad. This passionate tenderness was more than 
mere doting indulgence. , , ,t j 

As for the boy himself, he did not care for any other playmate. One of Lmcoln s life-guard 
has recorded the statement that the only times President Lincoln ever seemed genuinely happy 
were while they were romping through the stately old rooms of the Executive Mansion together, 
both whooping like wild Indians, playing horse or father carrying boy pickaback, or holding him 
high on his shoulders where Mr. Lincoln had always been in the habit of carrying the little boys, 
when Willie was playing too — Willie on one shoulder and Tad on the other. At such times Tad's 
small cup of joy was brimful, and he could give no better expression to it than by chuckhng and 
shouting: "O Papa-day! — Papa-day!" 

Where Tad had been the night of Lincoln's assassination no one knew 
exactly, but Thomas Pendel, the faithful old doorkeeper at the White House, 
relates that the little boy came in at the basement door very late, and 
clambered up the lower stairway with heartbroken cries of: 

"Tom Pen! Tom Pen! They've killed Papa-day! They've killed 

Papa-day!" 

* « * * * * * * * * 

They brought Mrs. Lincoln home in a state of collapse. The only 
wonder is that the horrible scene of which she had been a witness did not 
then and there dethrone her reason. During the gusts of grief to which she 
gave way, in spite of herself, little Tad would look up at her in terror and 
cry out: "Don't cry so. Mamma, or you will break my heart!" 

Then the horror-stricken mother would clasp the child in a passionate 
embrace, and cover his little upturned face with kisses and tears, summoning 
all the resolution of which she was capable, for the sake of her little boy. 
Between the two — his little mother and his little brother — poor Robert 
Lincoln had need of all the manly tenderness of his nature — "so like his 
father's," they all said. ... 

The terrific strain was too great for the desolate little woman who had 
been widowed by hideous cruelty, and she lay for many weeks, utterly 
prostrated, unable to go to the burial of her husband and Willie. 




Little Tsd Lincoln 



I9IO 



DECEMBER 



1910 



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WED. 



THUR. 



8 



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THE LINCOLN 




# 



STORY-CALENDAR 



THE GRANDEST GRIEF OF HISTORY 




FTER Lincoln was gone a compartment in a private cabinet was found crammed 
with threats of assassination. He never referred to these except to say that 
there was no use in taking precautions or being afraid. 

"If they want to kill me," he remarked, "they'll do it somehow." 
He lived constantly in the spirit which breathed out its love for all man- 
kind on that first Good Friday, long ago, saying: 

"Forgive them, they know not what they do." 

Wednesday, April 19th, was the day set for the funeral. It was the fourth 
anniversary of the first bloodshed of the Civil War, at Baltimore. 

"It was the grandest funeral 
That ever passed on earth," 

for, while the simple services were being held in the White House and Lincoln's body lay in state 
under the majestic dome of the Capitol at Washington, it is estimated that more than twenty-five 
millions of people in the United States and Canada, and all over the civilized world, gathered in 
their places and 

"Wept with the passion of an angry grief" 

over the noblest martyrdom of humanity. 

On Friday, April 21st, the funeral train started from the capital on that long, sad journey of 
two thousand miles, to Springfield, Illinois, reversing the route which Lincoln, as President-elect, 
had traversed on his triumphal way to Washington. In the cities where he had stopped to speak, 
his body was laid in state, and many thousands passed by "in silence and in tears." Across the 
open country the people stood with bared heads, even in the rain, while the solemn procession swept 
by. Watch-fires blazed at night along the route, and everything was done to express the bitter 
sorrow of his people, loving and beloved. 

William Cullen Bryant, who had been one of the first newspaper men to champion the cause 
of the "Rail-splitter" candidate amid the sneers and snobbery of the unfriendly press, with a strong 
editorial on Lincoln, "A Real Representative Man," now wrote the following funeral ode for the 
services in New York City: 



"O, slow to smite and swift to spare. 

Gentle and merciful and just! 
Who in the fear of God didst bear 
The sword of power, a nation's trust. 

"In sorrow by thy bier we stand. 
Amid the awe that husheth all. 
And speak the anguish of a land 
That shook with horror at thy fall. 



"Thy task is done, the bonds are free; 
We bear thee to an honored grave. 
Whose proudest monument shall be 
The broken fetters of the slave. 

"Pure was thy life; its bloody close 

Has placed thee with the Sons of Light 
Among the noble hearts of those 
Who perished in the cause of Right." 



I9IO 



DECEMBER 



1910 



SUN. 



II 



MON, 



12 



TUES. 



WED. 



THUR. 



FRI. 



SAT. 



13 14 15 16 17 



mmmmmmmmm- 



THC LINCOLN // »^ ^CJ \\ STORY-CALENDAR 




eJJ (Th^ it-itJL, ^irU«^, 0\m4^ 

-^:S:.>A^ ><nv</ fcTTw -^u-t/ ai^:*^ C/^<>L-U.tfa^-d c/w .Z:^ -^tjutU. (yf -^njtptfj. 
,^yjy,^^ U~^.U^ J^^i^Xo^ oMl^IJZZr ;t, ■£&a.,,Jj^^y y„w /^tr>- -t^ 

^ ^^,,^ -U.*.o^.><y,-^j^>J:, a^-o^ ■^«-*-*- ;«5^ -^ "^ c-t.r'^.U.^^ 






f 



The above letter is hanging on the wall of Oxford University, England, as a model of pure 
and exquisite English. After receiving this letter, three of Mrs. Bixby's sons, reported killed in 
battle, came home to her alive and well! There had been confusion in the records so all Mrs. 
Bixby's five sons were reported dead. This great joy was almost too much for that poor mother's 
heart. 



1910 DECEMBER '910 

SUN. MON. TUES. WED. THUR. FRI. SAT. 

18 19 20 21 22 23 24 



# 



THE LINCOLN 




J 



STORY-CALENDAR 




ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

Richard Henry Stoddard 

HIS man, whose homely face you look upon, 

Was one of Nature's masterful, great men; 
Born with strong arms, that unfought battles won. 

Direct of speech, and cunning with the pen. 
Chosen for large designs he had the art 

Of winning with his humor, and he went 
Straight to his mark which was the human heart! 

Wise, too, for what he could not break he bent. 
Upon his back a more than Atlas-load, 

The burden of the Commonwealth, was laid; 
He stooped and rose up to it, though the road 

Shot suddenly downwards, not a whit disi. '^ye'' 

Hold, warriors, councillors, kings! All now j^ve place 
To this dead Benefactor of the race ! 




I9IO 

SUN. 



DECEMBER 



MON. 



TUES. 



WED. 



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25 26 27 28 29 30 31 



\ 



